June 19, 1999. It was a Saturday.
Stephen King was walking. He does that a lot—or he did then, at least. He was trekking along the shoulder of Route 5 in Lovell, Maine, just enjoying the summer air. Then everything changed in a literal instant. A blue 1985 Dodge Caravan crested a hill, drifted off the road, and slammed into the most famous horror writer on the planet.
He didn't just get bumped. He flew.
King was tossed about 14 feet into the air before landing in a ditch. Honestly, it’s a miracle he survived at all. When people talk about Stephen King hit car incidents, they usually focus on the "Misery" of it all, but the reality was much more gruesome and, frankly, weirder than any of his novels.
The Van, the Driver, and the Chaos
The guy behind the wheel was Bryan Smith. He wasn't some villain from a book; he was just a guy distracted by his dog. Specifically, a Rottweiler named Bullet. Smith was reportedly reaching into the back seat to stop the dog from getting into a cooler when he lost control of the vehicle.
King was heading north. The van was heading south.
When the impact happened, King’s glasses were knocked off. He ended up in a depression in the ground, twisted in ways a human body isn't supposed to twist. His lower right leg was shattered so badly that doctors initially thought they’d have to amputate. His hip was fractured. His scalp was lacerated. His ribs were smashed. His spine was chipped in several places.
He was a mess.
The driver, Smith, actually stayed at the scene. He sat there, shocked. King later recalled that Smith told him he thought he'd hit a deer until he saw the glasses. There's something deeply chilling about that—being the master of macabre and suddenly finding yourself as the "deer" in someone else’s windshield.
The Long Road Through Maine Medical Center
They flew him to Maine Medical Center in Portland. It wasn't a quick fix. We’re talking five operations in ten days.
The surgeons had to put King’s leg back together with an external fixator—a metal cage with pins going directly into the bone. If you’ve ever seen pictures of those things, they look like something out of a Saw movie. King spent weeks in a state of morphine-induced haze and agonizing physical therapy.
What’s wild is how quickly he tried to get back to work.
Writing was his way of coping. He couldn't sit up for more than forty minutes at a time because the pain in his back and hip was so intense. But he sat there anyway. He finished On Writing during this period. If you read that book, the final section is one of the most raw, honest accounts of a near-death experience you'll ever find. He describes the smell of the grass in the ditch and the sight of his own bloody lap with a clinical, terrifying precision.
Life Imitating Art (and Vice Versa)
People always ask if this changed his writing.
Duh. Of course it did.
Look at The Dark Tower series. King literally wrote himself—and the accident—into the narrative. In the later books, the characters have to save "the writer" from the van on that same stretch of road in Maine. It’s meta, it’s trippy, and it was his way of processing the trauma.
Then there’s the van itself.
King actually bought the Dodge Caravan for $1,500. He wanted to keep it off eBay. He didn't want some weird fan buying the vehicle that almost killed him and turning it into a macabre roadside attraction. He had plans to smash it with a sledgehammer. Eventually, the van ended up in a junkyard and was crushed, which feels like the only right ending for that particular piece of metal.
The Tragedy of Bryan Smith
The story doesn't end with King getting better.
Bryan Smith, the driver, had a rough time. He was a man with a spotty driving record, and the media absolutely hounded him. He pleaded guilty to driving to endanger and was stripped of his license for a year.
A year later, on King's birthday in 2000, Smith was found dead in his trailer at age 43.
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The cause was an accidental overdose of painkillers. It’s a strange, sad parallel to King’s own struggle with pain medication during his recovery. King called the death "unfortunate" but didn't harbor the kind of vitriol you might expect. He seemed more tired of the whole ordeal than anything else.
The Lasting Legacy of the Accident
If you go to Lovell today, Route 5 looks like any other Maine road. Quiet. Green. Deceptively dangerous.
But for King fans, it's a landmark. The Stephen King hit car story is the dividing line in his career. There is "Before the Accident" King and "After the Accident" King.
The "After" King is a bit more reflective. You see it in Lisey’s Story and Duma Key. There’s a deeper focus on the fragility of the body and the sheer randomness of fate. He realized that a dog and a cooler of meat could end a legacy in a split second.
It also changed how he interacted with the world. He became more reclusive for a while, understandably so. He struggled with the "retirement" question for years, fueled by the fact that sitting at a desk was physically punishing for his mangled hip and back.
What You Should Know About Road Safety in Maine
This isn't just a celebrity gossip story. It’s a cautionary tale about rural driving.
- Shoulders are narrow. On roads like Route 5, there is very little room between the white line and the ditch. If you're walking, you are incredibly vulnerable.
- Distracted driving kills. Long, straight rural roads lull drivers into a false sense of security. Whether it's a phone or a Rottweiler, one second of looking away is all it takes.
- Pedestrian visibility. King was wearing a blue shirt. In the shadows of the trees on a bright day, he wasn't as visible as he could have been.
Practical Takeaways from the King Incident
If you find yourself walking on public backroads, always walk against traffic. King was doing this, which is likely why he saw the van coming and tried to dive out of the way. If his back had been turned, he’d likely be dead.
Recovery from major trauma isn't linear. King talked openly about the "black dog" of depression that followed the accident. If you're recovering from a similar injury, the mental hurdle is often higher than the physical one.
Don't wait to write your "On Writing." King was lucky he got to finish his masterpiece. The randomness of the Stephen King hit car event reminds us that the "someday" we're all waiting for to finish our projects isn't guaranteed.
The most important thing to remember is that King is still here. He's still publishing. He's still walking. But he’s much more careful about where he steps these days.
To dig deeper into this era of his life, read the "Postscript" in On Writing. It is the definitive account of the event, written by the man who lived through the windshield impact. It’s better than any news report you’ll find from 1999 because it captures the internal reality of surviving the unsurvivable.
Check your local laws regarding pedestrian rights-of-way, but remember that physics doesn't care about the law. A 4,000-pound van always wins. Stay alert, stay visible, and maybe keep your dog in a harness if you're driving through the Maine woods.