News coverage of any traffic fatality is sobering. But the stories and photographs of the April 13 freak accident that claimed the lives of a 37-year-old father and two of his young triplets are amost too troubling to look at or read.

Reports of any serious traffic accident offer a time for all drivers to remind themselves to drive more cautiously, avoid being distracted when behind the wheel and to try to constantly remain alert to the many potential dangers on the roadway.

In some cases, a serious accident is the result of risky behavior such as drinking or speeding. In others, a tragic accident is simply that — an accident.

Traffic accidents can, or should, trigger a sense of "there, but for the grace of God, go I" in drivers. Most drivers shudder at the realization that too many serious accidents involve being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Last week's triple fatal had all those elements and more. The driver of the minivan was doing nothing wrong or risky. He was wearing a seat belt, and his three young childen were all strapped in their safety seats. Yet, when a 5,000-pound, industrial-size wood chipper being towed by a trucktraveling in the opposite direction came loose from the truck's hitch and careened across Route 8 in Richland Township, Allegheny County, the father and two of the children were killed. The surviving child has undergone extensive surgeries at Children's Hospital in Pittsburgh, but is expected to survive.

The scope of the tragedy is hard to comprehend. The young father, Spencer Morrison, was a well-liked, respected social studies teacher in the Beaver School District. Many of his students at the funeral Mass praised him as a teacher and a person, with one student adding, "He was the first teacher who made me want to be in school."

He and his family were all very active in their church as well. And the children — what can be said about children? They were innocents and precious sources of joy to their parents, relatives and friends.

The devastating tragedy brought out some 600 people to the funeral Mass in the old auditorium at Mars High School, where emotions naturally were difficult to contain. The experienced priest, who had baptized the Morrison triplets in the spring of 2002, had to work at remaining composed, and many of the family members, friends and students taught by Morrison were visibly shaken as they exited the service.

Trying to make sense of such a tragedy is impossible, and the Rev. Thomas Burke, a friend of the Morrison family, had no answer, but did offer wise advice to those who asked, "Why?" His reponse — "Don't take life for granted. Appreciate the life you have because one day you're here, and the next you may not be."

While the spiritual aspects of this tragedy will never be understood, the mechanical and legal issues are being examined by authorities.

The most obvious question that has yet to be answered involves the safety chains required to be attached whenever a trailer is towed on a roadway. It is hoped that the investigation now under way will explain whether or not the safety chains failed, or if they were not attached at all, or attached improperly. Or it might be discovered that some other failure in the trailer hitch triggered the tragic sequence of events on April 13. Investigators also must determine what level of responsibility humans (the truck driver or others at the job site) played in this accident, particularly regarding who was responsible for attaching the trailer and securing the safety chains. And there are questions that must be answered about whether the truck was being driven safely and responsibly.

Drivers on that section of Route 8 will doubtless reflect on the tragedy in the weeks and months ahead. Presumably, truck drivers and heavy equipment operators who tow trailers are now double- and triple-checking their trailer hitches and safety chains before pulling out onto the roadways.

No sense can be made of the tragic accident that took the life of Spencer Morrison and two of his children. Morrison's brother, a state trooper from Franklin, praised his brother as a model for living a good and meaningful life, calling him "a great man" and suggesting that if more people lived their lives as his brother did, the world would be a better place.

Traffic fatalities are always tragic and disturbing. But the terrible accident that killed three members of the Morrison family somehow seems even more so.