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The wreck sent truck driver Thomas Dehoyos to South Peninsula Hospital. It also left a Michigan couple feeling lucky to be alive and had Mexican national Fernando Chavez lamenting his choice in bike routes for his commute to work.
Just before 3 p.m., Chavez was riding his bicycle across the road from the entrance to Mariner Park when his chain apparently fell off.
At the same moment, Jackie Clark and Elaine Walsh-Clark were in their RV headed south out the Spit Road, while Dehoyos was following a taxicab off the Spit in the northbound lane.
When Fernandez appeared and stalled in the roadway, the Clarks, the cab and the semi all slammed on their breaks. The RV and the cab managed to stop short of the bicyclist, who was still in the road. The trucker, meanwhile was closing in on the cab, which quickly maneuvered around Fernandez.
Fernandez barely jumped clear as the jackknifing truck slid into the RV, bouncing it backward and ripping off its Michigan license plate.
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The Clarks marveled that they could reach the turnaround point of a trip from Grayling, Mich., only to see this.
"It's amazing we could drive 5,000 miles and then have this happen," Jackie Clark said.
Fernandez, who hails from the southern Mexican state of Michoacan and works at El Pescador Restaurant, was visibly shaken from the accident.
When he was told he was free to go, he hugged Homer Police officers Andy Deveaux and Lary Kuhns.
