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News - Local / Metro Tuesday, Apr. 28, 2009
After crash, shock: 'I just heard a crunch'

Kelly Rahn was driving home to Columbia on Saturday night after a two-day hike in the Upstate with her two coonhounds, Bonsey and Buddy.

Bonsey, a 5-year-old Redtick Coonhound, was resting in the back of her 2003 Subaru Outback station wagon, while Buddy, a 4-year-old Treeing Walker Coonhound, was in the front passenger seat.

“He had just finished an eight-mile hike that day, and he was exhausted,” Rahn said of Bonsey. “Hopefully, he was sound asleep and was in a place where he wanted to be.”
Bonsey

Bonsey died Sunday in a crash on I-26.

Bonsey never made it home.

About 9:30 p.m., authorities say, a motorcycle traveling at least 100 mph crashed into the rear of Rahn’s station wagon on I-26 eastbound near the Broad River Road exit in the Irmo area.

The impact sent the driver of the 2009 Suzuki motorcycle, John E. White Jr., 41, of Newberry, crashing through the back window of Rahn’s Subaru, authorities said.

White died. So did Bonsey.

In an interview Monday with The State, Rahn, 39, an emergency room nurse at Palmetto Health Baptist, said she was still in shock over the crash — and the loss of her beloved dog, which she had rescued about 1½ years ago.

“We named him Bonsey because he was bones — he was skinny,” she said, noting he had become a 65-pound, healthy, energetic dog.

Rahn said she was traveling between 60 and 63 mph — her car on cruise control in the middle lane — when her car was rear-ended. She said she thinks she was struck closer to the White Rock exit, though she said she stopped near the Broad River Road exit.

“I just heard a crunch in the back, and windows popping. I was worried (Bonsey) was going to get thrown around.”

Rahn said she didn’t know at first that the motorcyclist had flown through her back window.

She said she quickly pulled off the highway, thinking the other driver would be right behind her to wait with her until police arrived.

“I didn’t really see anyone pulling up behind me. Then I went to the back (of the Subaru) and instead of my dog, I saw a dead body. His waist was pretty much bent at the hatch.”

Rahn said a pet gate that kept Bonsey in the back likely prevented the motorcyclist’s body from flying into the front of the vehicle. She said she and Buddy were unharmed.

A short time before the crash, a state trooper clocked White traveling at 99 mph and tried to stop him, “at which time the rider accelerated,” according to a Richland County Sheriff’s Department incident report. As the trooper “maintained a visual,” the motorcyclist “continued to pull away from him,” the report said.

From 2000 through 2007, White had been convicted four times for speeding — three times for speeding 10 mph or less, and once for speeding more than 10 mph but less than 25 mph, according to his 10-year driving history provided to The State by the S.C. Department of Motor Vehicles.

Before the crash, White’s last traffic violation was Feb. 23, 2008, when he was ticketed for careless or negligent driving; he was convicted on that charge March 5, 2008, records show.

Efforts Monday to reach White’s family were unsuccessful.

Rahn said she can’t understand why White was traveling so fast Saturday night.

“I feel for his family, and I’m sorry he lost his life. But whether you’re in cars or on motorcycles, everyone needs to slow down.

“Do you really need to get there that fast?”
Reach Brundrett at (803) 771-8484.[

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Its riders like that, that draw negative attention to the rest of us.
RIP rider and dog.

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