Parish priest hopes to see midnight car crash survivor locals at church.
Two men in Greenwood must have wondered what had happened when they crawled out of the wreckage of the car they were driving in the early hours of Friday, 9 March.
Gazing down on them from the front of the upturned car in the driveway of All Saints Church was the Blessed Virgin Mary – actually, a statue of her.
“I think Mary must have been watching over them. I’m wondering whether they thought ‘am I in heaven?’ parish priest Fr Vinh Dong told The Record.
However, he said, he had been asleep when the 3am crash took place and didn’t see the car until 6.45am when he got up for his exercise session.
A neighbour who did hear the crash got up and saw the dazed men crawling from the wreckage. Fr Vinh said the man called on them to stop but they fled the scene.
Police traced the men to a nearby residence and took them to hospital but they were released after treatment for minor injuries.
“I think they only had a few scratches to the head. It’s amazing,” Fr Dong said.
He said he understood the vehicle had been travelling along Orkney Road, mounted the footpath, struck the parish fence and then flipped in mid-air before coming to rest on its roof.
The car was removed later that morning but not until after a requiem Mass which was celebrated at the parish church.
The statue of Mary near where the vehicle landed had been in its niche for 25 years since the parish was first built.
“I hope I see them coming to church soon,” he said. “They live near here.”