Cook's Corner Crash Should Put Everyone on Alert

It's a Saturday and Cook's Corner will fill up tonight. As men and women head to the iconic South Orange County roadhouse, they'll pass a large oak tree and step onto a footbridge that takes them across a ravine where the good times roll.

It may go unnoticed by many, the bark of the tree stripped away or the charred trunk. Revelers certainly won't notice the faint remains of tire marks that lead oddly from the the big intersection at Santiago Canyon Road and head right toward the weathered oak.  They aren't skid marks, just remnants of the scrub of speed.

A week ago, on Sunday, Matthew Zane of Las Vegas died in his 2010 Acura CTX, the engine of his car smashed up against his body. He was 62, and died on impact. That much was obvious to those who broke windows to try to help him out, only to be turned away by the sight. Better to leave it to the professionals.

Tragic as the outcome was, the body count could have been much worse. Most patrons had already left after the Super Bowl. It was a few minutes past 9 p.m., and it wasn't busy. A witness said there were about eight people on the patio at the time of the crash. They dove under tables to avoid flying debris. Patrons minding their own business suddenly in the line of fire.

One can only shudder to think what might have happened. Without the tree, the Acura would have certainly carried into the patio area, possibly the building itself.

"Had he not been stopped, he could have gone into the structure," said Eric Barnard, spokesman for the California Highway Patrol, which responded to the scene. "I don't like to use the term 'got lucky,' but . . ."

Rhonda Palmeri, the events director at Cook's Corner, said she "(doesn't) deal in speculation," about what what might have been. "It could have been worse, but it wasn't," she said. "It is what it is."

But here's something that isn't speculative. There has been a rash of fatal or serious crashes locally, enough to put everyone on edge and on guard:

• Less than a week earlier than Zane's crash—and just, a couple miles down the road from the bar, a over and injured two, one critically; witnesses estimated it doing 100 mph.
• A day before the Porsche flipped, there was , which eventually becomes Santa Margarita Parkway, when a car was T-boned by another.
• Less than a month ago on Bake Parkway, when her car was struck by a truck heading toward Portola.
• Less than two months ago, up the road from Cook's Corner, that left two dead.

That's five deaths since Dec. 12 and that doesn't include on I-5 near Crown Valley Parkway on Jan. 9, or thes on Jan. 6 when his car went off the 241 toll road in Mission Viejo heading toward RSM.

Driving to Cook's Corner to take pictures of the tree—the heroic tree, it turns out—was a new experience. Not because it has been years since I've been out there, but because no other cars could be trusted. Not for one moment. Not now.

Defensive driving has never been more important. And even then it might not matter.