I decided to drive the wheelchair to my father's house,so a friend took me to the garage on his motorcycle and waited to lead me home. I practiced with the wheelchair for a few minutes,and,when I had the hang of it,we started down a road that had a canal on each side. Things went well for the first half mile,but when I came off a bridge, I encountered and oncoming car and panicked. I lost control of the wheelchair and plunged into a canal,where I ended up standing in waist-deep water beside the wheelchair, which was stuck in the mud.