Airman Lydia Faux 3: Drink, Drive, Die

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Tiffany M. Deuel
  • 48th Fighter Wing Public Affairs
ROYAL AIR FORCE LAKENHEATH, England - --  Following the fire at Senior Airman Jake Laernu's house, things began to roll downhill for him and his family. In a three month period, his wife Helen lost her aunt to breast cancer and he lost his father to a drug overdose. To make matters worse, the bad news and financial problems following the fire led to Jake and Helen getting a divorce. Two months after the divorce, the office began to notice that Jake was no longer the man he once was.

With Helen and his daughter Hannah now living three states away, he could hardly keep his mind on work. We all asked him to go talk to a counselor or a chaplain, to help figure things out, but he wouldn't listen. Instead, he turned to alcohol.

Every weekend, and some weekdays, Jake could be found all alone at the local bar throwing back beers and shots. He never showed up drunk to work and whenever he drank he always took a taxi home, so no one suspected that things would go awry, but we were wrong.

One Saturday night, Jake decided to drive to a bar two hours away from the local area. He drank enough alcohol to have a blood alcohol content of 0.12, whereas the legal limit  is 0.08.

Around 3 a.m. Sunday morning, Jake's car came into contact with another car. Jake had lost consciousness and went into the opposing lane, hitting the vehicle head on at 45 miles an hour. Jake, having been too drunk to drive was also too drunk to remember to put on his seat belt. Jake flew from through the windshield. When ejected, Jake landed on the other vehicle, no longer unconscious, but dead.

The driver and passenger of the other vehicle, a sober couple returning from the airport having finished their honeymoon, did not escape the accident unscathed either. The woman died on impact, hitting her head several times on the steering wheel and on the window. The man lost his legs, due to being pinned by the dashboard. He survived the crash, but lost his wife and unborn son.

Arriving at work Monday morning, upon receiving the news of Jake's death, the office settled into an uncomfortable silence, for no one knew what to say. We had all seen the signs of his downward spiral, but we were either too busy to help or didn't try hard enough to get him treatment.

The silence was uncomfortable because we knew we were all at fault not being wingmen at a time when we were needed the most. What if we had escorted him to the chaplain or mental health? What if we had encouraged him every weekend to spend time with us in sober environments? What if we had intervened, despite his rejections? What if? Maybe he would be alive today and also the couple and their unborn child. Instead, here we sit performing the daily duties at the office, with the sight of an empty desk amongst the rest of the office, a sign of loss and guilt.

Author's note: All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental. Having a plan for drinking activities should be of the utmost importance to all people, otherwise they could have a story similar to Airman Lydia Faux's; except their story would be true.