‘The semi was airborne.’ KY nurse on trip to see injured brother helps crash victims

Veronica Combs was in the wrong place at the right time, and it might have saved two lives.

On Aug. 3, Combs, a nurse from Williamsburg, was driving to Chattanooga, Tenn., to see her hospitalized younger brother Jay Fore. Fore had been hit by a train in late July and had to have his leg amputated.

At mile marker 308 on I-40, near Crossville, Tenn., Combs’ Jeep and a white J. B. Hunt tractor-trailer were the only vehicles around. Combs had gotten lost and was about to exit the interstate when she saw something in her rearview mirror.

“I remember looking down to turn my air on, and then I looked up in my rearview mirror, and the semi was airborne. It jumped over the guardrail and just flew through the trees,” she said. “My first instinct was to say to myself, ‘God, I don’t think I can take any more of this;’ we’ve been through a lot lately.”

Combs said she pulled her Jeep over to see what she could do to help as the sole witness to the accident.

“That’s my nature, I’ve helped many, many accidents,” she said. “I’m honestly glad that God gave me the knowledge and the skills to do what I did.”

There were two people in the truck, a male driver and a female passenger. Combs said the driver was stable although he was trapped in the cab, and the passenger had been ejected. According to the Tennessee Highway Patrol, the man and woman were named David Fendley and Melinda Pilley.

Fendley asked Combs to find Pilley, whom he called his wife. “He was so calm. He was in horrible shape, but I like to think that I was there to guide him and calm him down,” she said.

Combs was able to stabilize Pilley until EMS arrived. As a nurse, Combs is not able to reveal more about their conditions.

“They were not very happy with my ways of getting up [to Fendley],” she said. “I just scaled up the front of the cab, and there was diesel gas everywhere ... I was trying to work and keep them talking to me.”

By the time paramedics arrived, Combs said she was bleeding from the broken glass, but she got back in her car and drove the rest of the way to see her brother.

Combs said she often finds herself in situations like these but said she is glad she can use her skills to help people.

“I guess I’m just really hyper-aware of my surroundings. If I wouldn’t have looked in my rearview mirror, I would not have even seen that truck and I would have went on,” she said. “It was like the perfect moment.”