Southern California TV news cracks me up

[capybara]

Now, we just moved down here last year from the northwest (and some time in the mid-west rural-ish). Now, it seems every other night there's a live high-speed car chase on the TV news. I love it, in a sort of guilty way. It's so entertaining-- real Real TV, like watching the OJ chase every Thursday ("A murder suspect-- cool! Oh, he hit another car.. . . do you think he'll snuff himself?. . .can he make it to Mexico? Spike strip! Oh no, a bus!"). There's never anything else of interest, but boy, what a car culture! So many great car chases.
Just sharing. It beats Portland area forestry-and-salmon drama and even Bobby Knight tossing things at undergrad ball players.

[Violet]

Amazing stuff!

[Typo Negative]

Welcome to SoCal!

[Roadwalker]

That bus chase a few months agao was one of the coolest things I've ever seen on TV. I was rivited with my chex mix for the whole 2 or 3 hours.

[BraheSilver]

Bus chase? Oh wait, that one. I got confused with that van chase a while back, then that truck, and the Suburban one...

Hang on, I've got a pressing urge to play GTA for some reason.

Let me second a "welcome," but it seems I'm off by about a year.

[rjung]

A few years ago, there was a local news article about a business that would page you or call you whenever a police chase occurred, so you could be sure to catch it as it happened.

Dunno if they're still in business.

[Johnny L.A.]

Ah, yes. Southern California. "The Car Chase Capital of the World."

Roadwalker: You should have seen the bus chase they had several years ago. This guy wanted a job as a bus driver, but they woudln't hire him. So he stole a bus to show then he knew how to drive one. He was west on the 10, north on PCH, I think he came back east on the 101 (but I don't recall), over to the 405 south, then he got off at the now-closed Waterford exit. He hended up on a small residential street (in an MTA bus!) and backed into a cruiser (I think he was charged with attempted murder for that).

But before he was finally caught he was all over the place. At one point he caught a chain-link fence and was dragging that around. It flailed around like a whip -- or whipped around like a flail -- when he went aroud corners.

Anyway, that was a good one. I liked the reason for it, too. Better than just some bad guy trying to get away. "I can drive a bus! Look!"

capybara: If you like the car chases, just wait for Storm Watch: 2002 (or 2003). Coming from the Northwest, you should find that especially amusing.

[Violet]

And -- I think it was in San Diego where someone stole an Army tank & drove off:

http://www.atasite.org/2002apr14.html

http://beggingdogrecords.tripod.com/tank.html

A sad story...

[Roadwalker]

I saw that one on Real TV Johnny. Way cool. Do you think chases are better at night for the sparks?
So how soon will there be another exciting chase?

[pepperlandgirl]

I remember, the day after I settled into my new apartment in So Cal there was a car chase on the TV--it was very riveting. Though what I don't understand is why they follow the chases for hours pre-empting everything else, (it really pisses me off when they do it during Judge Judy!) when it's not like we haven't already seen a billion other car chases! I guess we all have a sick fascination with the chance that something horrible may happen.

[runforrestrun]

Hey Capybara, I'm just a couple hours north of you in Atascadero. We used to get the LA news (channel 5 news at 10, KTLA) and there was always so many chases to watch. Im an addict. The ultimate irony would be a car chase that ended up stopped in traffic on the freeway. That should happen more often. Then what would you do? Keep watching? It would be a lesson to us all to stop watching these insanely intriguing things.

[Gozu Tashoya]

Originally posted by pepperlandgirl
I remember, the day after I settled into my new apartment in So Cal there was a car chase on the TV--it was very riveting. Though what I don't understand is why they follow the chases for hours pre-empting everything else, (it really pisses me off when they do it during Judge Judy!) when it's not like we haven't already seen a billion other car chases! I guess we all have a sick fascination with the chance that something horrible may happen.

Judge Judy, nothing! I remember one a few years back where they pre-empted everything during primetime!