I spent the last 2 days mostly on I-95 and in each direction, I saw other vehicles that made me alter my position in traffic.
Southbound, I saw a king cab pickup pulling a trailer. Normally, that wouldn’t be a big deal, but this one terrified me. The trailer was one of the smaller ones with small wheels that was intended for light-weight towing in slower-speed situations. (For those who don’t know, the smaller wheels have to spin way faster than your vehicle’s tires at highway speeds and the wheel bearings get really hot really fast - not smart or safe.)
This particular utility trailer had plywood sides all around, going up at least 6’, perhaps 8’ if they used full sheets. And despite not being able to see what was within, it was apparent that the trailer was loaded, and too much of the weight was behind the wheels because it fishtailed for no apparent reason. :eek:
The pickup that was pulling it was so loaded in its bed that the body was extremely low over the rear wheels and raised considerably on the front end. Definitely not a safe configuration, especially not at 70MPH on a fairly busy interstate highway. At least they were in the right lane. As soon as I was able, I zipped past them on the left and was safely on my way. I hope they got where they were going without havoc or injury, but I wouldn’t be surprised at a trailer tire blowout. :eek:
On the way back north, we saw an SUV with stuff on its roof. Not on a rack - just on the roof! At least that’s how it looked. One of the items was a carrier similar to this. It was sitting towards the rear of the roof, cocked at least 30° off the center axis of the vehicle, with no visible tie-downs as far as we could see. I know it wasn’t just sitting up there with the rest of the stuff, but the whole setup was precarious enough that we backed off, then took the opportunity to take a rest stop at the next exit. Once we resumed our trip, we didn’t see any evidence along the road that the cargo had departed the vehicle, but it sure looked like it wanted to! I swear, I didn’t see any tie-down straps at all! Maybe the carrier and the luggage all contained high-strength magnets that held them to the roof?? Yeah, that must have been it. :smack:
Can you top that? Have you encountered vehicles that you were *sure *were about to cause mayhem or disaster?
Locally about a year back, I was on the little expressway that goes through here and there was a loveseat and matching chair on the side of the road. Couldn’t help but wonder if they fell of the back of a truck and no one noticed.
My favorite was about ten years back when there were pecans all over the expressway. Those lanes had to be closed so the pecans could be scooped up. To my credit, I resisted the urge to stop and help myself.
Driving down the highway in San Antonio I saw a beater which had no (listed in the order which I noticed):
*Rear bumper
*Rear window
*Driver’s side doors (the front passenger side door was the only one)
*Seat back on the driver’s seat
*Hood
It looked for all the world like the car had caught on fire, but somehow still drove (poorly).
Amish communities have non-Amish who are willing to drive Amish folks places for money. They put up scraps of paper on store bulletin boards offering rides (no phone numbers, just a description: grey house north of Ed Stoltzfus’ barn).
So, I saw a pickup truck with six adult Amish men sitting in the open truck bed in a horrible August torrential downpour. It was raining hard enough for drivers to have their four ways flashing. Dudes were very wet. Truck cab contained the driver only.
Brings back memories of my deployment in Sicily. I didn’t drive there, but I was in a bus one day and approaching us going in the opposite directions I saw, honest to goodness, FOUR cars abreast, three of which were passing the car or cars to the right. I was sure we were going to be part of a head-on collision…
Also in Sicily, and possibly in Spain, more than once I saw truck loaded and overloaded with bales of hay - they seemed to defy gravity! I can’t imagine how the vehicles handled. And then there were the Vespas, loaded with more crap that I would have thought possible! Wish I’d had a camera with me back then.
The worst around here is the idiot motorcycle rider who speeds down the highway on 1 wheel, even at night. Nobody can figure out who he is but everybody I know wants to smack the crap out of him.
I was once behind a flatbed loaded down with bales of hay on I-5 in Northern California. As if a big invisible hand had picked it up, I watched one of the bales fly off the back of the truck. It was far enough ahead that it posed no danger, I simply changed lanes and went around it. But if someone had been right behind the truck…
Another time, also on I-5 but between Tacoma and Seattle, there were suddenly hundreds of rolls of toilet paper bouncing all over the freeway. I never did figure that one out, I don’t remember seeing any rigs pulled over on the side of the road or anything.
Years ago I was driving north on I-95 through Baltimore, about to enter the tunnels. I was behind an SUV that was towing a very small U-Haul trailer, and at some point, I noticed the trailer was gently swerving from side to side. It quickly began swerving more and more violently, sparks came out from underneath it, more extreme oscillation from the trailer…I slowed way down in fear, and finally the trailer just snapped off completely. It luckily missed hitting anyone but careened into the cement wall to the left of the left-most lane, and the SUV pulled off on the shoulder on the right. I kept driving.
All these years later, I still wonder how (or if) the driver managed to get across all the lanes of traffic to retrieve his trailer and cross back with it to get to his car.
Years ago, when I was a relatively inexperienced driver, I was driving a rental car on an interstate highway in New Mexico with my father as passenger. As we approached an entrance ramp far ahead on our right, a large boxy sedan of some sort pulled up to the end of the ramp, put on its left blinker, and turned left into oncoming highway traffic. I immediately internalized why my father had taught me to “look for escape routes” when driving, and went right off the shoulder into the grass. As the vehicle passed, I could see the driver was a large, boozy looking woman scowling furiously.
I checked my rearview, and sure enough, she drove off down the wrong side of the divided highway, straddling the center line, forcing cars in both lanes to flee, all the way to the limit of my vision on the straight, sun-drenched highway. There were so may cars on the grass it looked like event parking.
Never heard anything more about the incident, but we were visiting from out of state, so we missed any local follow-up stories.
[QUOTE=FairyChatMom]
Have you encountered vehicles that you were *sure were about to cause mayhem or disaster?
[/QUOTE]
I regularly encounter pickups/small trucks whose beds are stuffed to the brim with furniture, mattresses and various household doodads, precariously tied down (or not secured at all). I move away from them as fast as prudently possible.
*Based on a trend of regional popularity, Mrs. J. and I generically refer to such vehicles as “Kentucky Van Lines”.
A few years ago I was driving on1-66 between DC and Winchester, VA. A bed liner flew out of the back of a pickup and missed us by inches. I was with my two sons, who were pretty young and oblivious to the whole thing. I, on the other hand, was lucky I didn’t have to stop and change underwear.
I saw a 15-passenger van, fully occupied, towing a small RV trailer behind it. And behind the trailer was a boat on its own trailer. :eek:
We came upon a one-vehicle accident a few years ago. A pickup towing a trailer had obviously lost control (probably no sway bars) and the trailer, which was probably 25’ long, had flipped onto its side. The rear of the pickup was off the ground, suspended from the trailer tongue by the runaway chains. A family stood on the side of the road, staring at the mess in disbelief.
After working at an RV dealership, I notice overloaded or improperly towed vehicles a lot more than I used to. It puzzles me that people will take a chance not only with their safety, but seem to have no regard for the drive train and suspension on the car/van/truck they’re using.
There really should be an endorsement to the driver’s license for towing. There are so many things that can go wrong just because people don’t know.
Once, my husband and a friend were towing our Hunter 23 with a big ol’ van. The load wasn’t the problem, but without thinking, they had the outboard on the motor mount and it was far enough behind the trailer wheels that when the boat trailer started to fishtail, it made it worse. Fortunately, my husband immediately recognized what was happening and they pulled over, then moved the outboard to the vee berth so it was forward of the wheels. The rest of the trip was uneventful.
I think a basic understanding of the physics of towing would go a long way in making people safer. Well, maybe. Some people are just plain stupid regardless of what they’ve supposedly been taught…
In Haiti, motorcycles are everywhere and traffic laws are, um, completely disregarded:
Underlining mine
All “taxis” are dangerously overloaded. The most people I saw on one motorcycle was six - 4 adults and 2 kids. The oddest load was 2 adults and a mini fridge. A very scary place to be in a vehicle.
