Left to die by the side of the road.

Every now and then you run into a story that makes you lose faith in humanity. This is one of those stories.

A friend of mine was badly hurt in a hit-and-run accident last Tuesday and left for dead by the side of the road.

That friend of mine is Mark Ortiz.

Mark lives in Kannapolis and is well known to a lot of people who are active on the left side of the political spectrum. He was a candidate in the Democratic primary in 2006 for the 8th congressional race and he's the local head of "drinking liberally", a chapter of a national organization that holds regular social gatherings in The Sweet Pea cafe in downtown Concord.(Drinking liberally is not a group of alcoholics by the way, it's just a funny name for a progressive group.)

Mark is an avid bicyclist who rode his bike almost 10,000 miles just this year and he was riding his bicycle back home at about 10 pm on Tuesday November 7th, on his way back from attending a meeting at UNC Charlotte. Mark's bike is very well lit and Mark always wears a helmet.

A driver hit him from behind somewhere on Roberta Rd. in Harrisburg. The driver just drove on and left Mark laying by the side of the road in freezing temperatures.
Apparently Mark laid there unconscious for about an hour and a half before EMT personnel, that just happened to drive by, found him. He was immediately brought to our local hospital in Concord, where they decided that his condition was too serious for them to handle. He was then transported to the trauma unit of Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte. I was told by a doctor and nurse that they didn't think he was going to make it when they brought him in.
Mark is still there today.

The good news is that Mark's life doesn't seem to be in danger anymore and that he's in stable condition. The bad news is that he has a lot of fractures. We know of at least 4 broken ribs, several broken vertebrae and a broken pelvis. The road to recovery will be long. The surgeon at CMC assured us that they "will pull him through". I've so far visited Mark twice in the hospital and he looks better every time I see him. Today he was moved out of the Intensive Care Unit into a "regular room". He is scheduled for some major back surgery next week.

State Highway Patrol has possession of Mark's bike right now. They're holding on to it for evidence purposes. The silly thing is that Mark was very concerned about the fate of his bike :-)
Judging by where Marks major injuries are, it seems likely that who ever drove into him was driving a big vehicle, probably an SUV or pick-up truck.

We are also trying to get some major press attention for this accident in an effort to find who ever is responsible for Mark's condition.
You might have seen a little article in the Charlotte Observer today and I know there is a bigger article on the way.
Our local weekly newspaper, the Concord Standard and Times, will publish an article in next weeks edition and The Independent Tribune is also interested in covering the accident.

Finding out about whoever was the driver responsible for this is of course also very important because of the huge medical bills Mark is facing.
Mark will have big bills to pay, that's why we're planning on doing a benefit to raise some money for him. Mark was apparently aiming to ride 10,000 miles (!) on his bike this year and we know he was only 15 miles away from reaching that goal when he got run over this past Tuesday. Because Mark can't ride those last 15 miles anymore this year we will. There's a group of cyclists in Concord who are willing to do a 15 mile charity ride where each rider will get sponsored per mile he/she rides. We don't have an exact date yet on when we will have this charity ride, but I will let you know when we have more precise plans.

In the meantime I have set up an e-mail account that people can use to send wishes to Mark: Get Well Mark
I urge anyone send him a little note and I will make sure he gets all the emails in the hospital.
If you have any tips or leads on who ever could have been the driver that drove into Mark, please send them to the same e-mail address.

Finally, if you drive your car, please remember that cyclists have the exact same rights on the road as cars do. There are more and more cyclists showing up in our area and there will be more and more of them as gas prices keep rising.
So watch out and share the road!

UPDATE 11/15: You can now check all the latest updates on Mark's condition on www.getwellmark.com