It was just a little fender bender.  Nobody was hurt and even the cars seemed to be more or less OK.  In a moment of distraction, Peter failed to notice that the car ahead of him had come to a stop.  Although he reacted as quickly as he could, before he could come to a complete stop he gently smashed into the car ahead of him.  Although jolted from the rear, none of the occupants of the car that he hit were injured.

As required by law Peter and the driver of the other car immediately pulled over to assess the damage and to see if anyone was hurt.  Had either party failed to do so and driven away, that driver could be charged with hit-and-run.  Instead they both did the responsible thing which was to first check for injuries and upon discovering there were none, fill out a joint report of accident.

Peter apologized profusely to the other driver for his moment of inattention and fortunately aside from a small dent in the bumper, there seemed to be no damage caused to the car he hit.  Peter’s car seemed to suffer a little bit more damage in that his front grill was pushed in a little bit and his hood was knocked out of alignment.

As there were no injuries they had no legal obligation to call the police and after exchanging identification information and filling out the joint report, both parties went their own way.  Peter intended to get his car fixed at the next possible moment but with his busy work schedule it looked like he would be driving with a dented front end for at least a couple of weeks.

In doing so Peter made two mistakes.  Firstly, the law requires that all cars must be kept in good working order.  Failure to do so will lead to a fine ranging from $60-$100 for both the owner of the vehicle and the driver.

The second mistake Peter made was in failing to have  the car checked out by a mechanic and assuming that the fender bender had caused nothing more than cosmetic damage.  Little did he know what was in store for him.

About a week later he was driving down the Metropolitan at the legal speed limit when all of a sudden his hood popped open and lifted up smashing into his windshield.  The windshield immediately cracked and blistered and the hood obliterated all of his forward visibility.  Fortunately Peter was an excellent driver and remembered to keep calm in this harrowing situation.  He took a quick glance at his side view and rearview mirrors and saw that there was no one on either side of him or behind him.  He gently hit the brakes and brought the car to a controlled stop praying that there was no car ahead of him.  Luck was on his side and he brought the car to a safe stop without hitting anything.

He immediately turned on his flashers and once again checking his side view mirror made sure that it was safe for him to exit the car.  He got out of his car and put the hood back down tying it in place with a piece of cord.  Although his windshield was starred he could see clearly enough to drive the car off the Metropolitan and exit at the first ramp where he called a tow truck from the side of the road.

Although Peter did everything right from the moment his hood flew open he would never have been in this predicament in the first place if he had not played his own mechanic and decided that his car was good to go after his first "little" accident.