Driving away from Sacramento on Highway 50 now you wouldn’t know that days before, for what amounts to a moment in freeway time, the steady traffic stood still.
In that moment, a chain of brake lights in each lane led drivers’ eyes to a pit of flashing lights, just before an empty expanse of road where each car had intended to be but wasn’t. In the eastbound direction, between the queue of cars and congregation of responders, lay a motionless helicopter, not in the sky, but on the ground; not right-side-up but on its roof.
An aircraft used to rescue people from emergencies was causing one…