On July 21, 2005 at 7:13 a.m., Kylee Bittner was traveling east on I-94 heading to Bismarck to pick up her nephew for the weekend. She wants to let everyone know her story and how a simple thing like buckling her seatbelt saved her life.

Kylee fell asleep a short distance from the Sweet Briar exit. Her car was going left heading for the median, when her car’s wheels going across the rumble strips woke her up. She tried to correct by turning to the right, which brought her back up onto the highway, into the ditch on the right, and up over a hill. She rolled the car an estimated three times. Her car spun, hit two wooden fence posts and came to a stop facing northwest.

She does not remember rolling, but when the car stopped right side up with the engine still running, she remembers turning it off. She remembers that she had to get out of the car. Kylee tried to open the door but it was stuck so she crawled out the driver’s window. When she reached the top of the hill she saw a car parked on the side of the road and another car pulling over. This was someone she knew from her hometown of Glen Ullen. He took her into his car, tried to calm her down and let her use his cell phone so she could call her mom.

After the call to her mother, she looked over herself finding only a few little scrapes and cuts. She only had one deep scratch on her left arm.

It only took a few minutes for the highway patrol to arrive at the accident scene. The first question asked by the Highway Patrolman was “Were you wearing your seatbelt?” “Yes”, Kylee replied.

The Highway Patrolman told Kylee that if she hadn’t been wearing her seatbelt, he didn’t know if she would be here right now.

Here are some thoughts from Kylee: “This accident is the scariest thing that has ever happened in my life. I would just like to ask everyone to please wear your seatbelt because it saved my life and it could save yours too!”