Ten years ago this week Toronto experienced its biggest storm since 1954’s Hurricane Hazel.

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Howard Levitt: 10 years ago, I ditched my Ferrari in an epic Toronto storm and it's still the first thing anyone asks me about Back to video

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That storm ended up playing an unexpected and outsized role in my own professional life. In fact, most people I meet across Canada know me, not because of my legal accomplishments — six books, editor-in-chief of a national law report, this column, the most appearances before our nation’s highest court of any employment lawyer in our history — but because of what occurred that day.

I had people emailing me from the Philippines, Germany and elsewhere, telling me that they were exhorting their children to go into law because of what transpired and how I reacted.

I was driving to the Island airport to catch a flight to Ottawa for a case the next day. When you drive through a puddle, you can’t see whether it is an inch deep or 10 feet. There was a relatively new underpass on Simcoe Street near the lake and I had no idea that the puddle I drove into would stop my car in its tracks. There were three geysers of raw sewage pouring out around me and my car was quickly going under. When it reached half way up my windows and I realized that my time to exit was rapidly diminishing, I pushed open the door, grabbed my wet suitcase from the trunk and headed to the airport.

Calls to taxis went unheeded — all of Toronto seemingly was trying to catch a ride — so I stopped a cab with a passenger already in it and offered them both cash to let me in and take me to the airport after the passenger was dropped off. When we reached the Island airport, though, there was a line of people waiting for taxis themselves because that airport had been closed due to the weather. I quickly phoned and got the very last seat to Ottawa from Pearson airport, scheduled for 11:30 p.m. It actually left at 3 a.m., allowing me little time to write my column for this paper due that night and make it to the hearing.

Now, many cars were flooded that night. But since I was driving a Ferrari, it became the symbol of the flood. The pilot who I chatted with while waiting for my flight told me that social media was lambasting the moron who evidently had more money than brains and abandoned his Ferrari. I must admit to remaining silent.

Hoping it would never be known, I was chagrined, after a successful hearing the next day, to open my emails to one from the Toronto Star, which had traced my license plate.

I have always believed you should speak to the press and, with the story that the pilot told me, I realized telling my tale could not do any further damage.

So I told them what had and had not happened.

I did not use the flood as an excuse to miss my court date. I did not offer some mealy explanation to the other side to seek a delay. Neither even entered my mind. The truth was, it was only money, no one was hurt, the car would be replaced and there was no reason whatsoever to do anything other than find a way to get to Ottawa and do my job. That is in my DNA and doing anything else would have required a personality transplant.

I am not alone in this reaction. The good members of my profession would all do the same. It is what you learn in law school — and hopefully grade school and at home.

The positive publicity Ferrari received — no one made a fuss about the flooded Toyotas — resulted in my getting a good deal on a new one. And RSA Canada insurance decided to only charge my deductible after originally arguing for a large depreciation. A year later, the agent I dealt with wrote to inform me that she got a new job using the nice things I said about her and RSA as her reference.

A judge who is a close friend of mine said that if the incident had not happened, I would have invented it. But I’m not sure my imagination extends that far. There are, however, important lessons for everyone in this.

First, turn lemons into lemonade. There are opportunities in every crisis and consider those when dealing with whatever life throws at you.

Second, referencing my negotiations with RSA, consider what your leverage points are in every negotiation and what you can offer your negotiating partner.

Third, remember your calling and strive to fulfill it and never take the easy way out.

Finally, always go the extra mile. Leaving the car behind, convincing a taxi to take me, not giving up when the Island airport was closed, not going home as flights were cancelled and waiting until 3 a.m., washing my sewage-laden suit in my Ottawa hotel and using the hairdryer to dry it … one could stop at any point along the way and give up. But then you are doing nothing for your client and even less for yourself. And at the end of the day, you are nothing without self-respect.

Howard Levitt is senior partner of Levitt Sheikh, employment and labour lawyers with offices in Toronto and Hamilton. He practices employment law in eight provinces. He is the author of six books including the Law of Dismissal in Canada.