Had a ‘road rage’ incident when I was 20, a guy cut me off and almost caused me to wreck, then flipped me the ‘bird’, words/hand ‘signals’ were exchanged. He stopped in front of me on the feeder, I got out of my truck and just as I was going around my door towards his car, (to do what, I really couldn’t say :smack:) I noticed that he was leaning across the seat, like he was getting something out of the ‘glove box’. The guy leaned out of his window, pointing something. As I was diving behind my door, I heard a ‘pop’ and saw a flash. Later, I found the dent where the bullet had hit the only piece of metal that could have possibly stopped it, as opposed to putting a hole in my radiator. :mad:
Saved a 3 year old girl that had drowned. Little girl had jumped into the deep end of a swimming pool without anyone seeing it happen. I happened to be sitting at a table by the pool when I heard some other little kids holler out, “She’s drowning!” She was motionless at the bottom of the pool. I bailed off into the shallow end of the pool just as a guy that had been sunning himself at the far end rolled into the water and swam down to her. I had waded to where the water was waist deep as he surfaced with her, out of breath. He handed her to me and I waded back to the end of the pool and placed her on the edge and climbed out. She had stopped breathing and her eyes were rolled back into her head, but she still had a faint pulse. I got about a cupful of water out of her, then started mouth to mouth resuscitation. After about 1 to 1-1/2 minutes, she started breathing again.
I had taken a Red Cross First Aid course when I was about 13-14 years old, while in the Boy Scouts. I was 24-25 at the time, and if you had asked me if I knew what to do in the event of a drowning, right before it all happened, I can guarantee that I wouldn’t have been able to tell you what to do. It was almost surreal how I knew exactly what to do, in that moment. :eek:
Caught a ‘strong arm’ purse snatcher (that was only 16 years old) after a prolonged car and foot chase. Wrecked my van in the process, when he rammed the side of it trying to get away. (in a stolen truck) Held him till the cops got there.
The court was inclined to drop the charges, because he had a twin brother, and the victim couldn’t make a positive ID. The prosecutor kept asking me if I had ever “lost sight” of him, even for only a few seconds. I said, “Hell no, I didn’t lose sight of him. I can pick him out right now.” and pointed at him. (This was before the trial had even started.) Turns out, if I had lost sight of him (for only a few seconds even) that the charges would have been dropped, and I would have been stuck with the cost of repairs to my van. He got two years probation and part of the conditions were that he had to pay full restitution for repairs, before they would end his probation.
(And that’s just a few incidents, out of many! I’ve always had a pretty exciting life. ;))
Does anyone remember the movie Duel, with Dennis Weaver? A guy is driving on mountain roads and is harassed by a guy in a semi. Drives right on his ass, sometimes ramming him, sometimes passes then slows down, tries to engineer a collision with an oncoming car, etc.
A few years after that came out someone did that to my sister-in-law.
Late one night I was following a friend to his place, and two cars sped past us. Nothing unique about that, except that the passengers in the two cars were shooting at each other. We called the cops and gave a description of one of the cars, but we never heard anything more on it.
Driving down Santa Monica Blvd. about 3 in the morning, and there’s a car sitting in the right lane, on its top. Lights were still on. No one to be seen in the car. We drove past it, slowly. The radio was on. (I wish I could remember what was playing.) We were just high enough to look at each other in amazement and then just keep going. (This was before the days of cell phones or we might have called 911.)
When I was in high school, we were drag racing another car down a boulevard at around 70 mph when we came to a sweeping turn.
We were on the inside and had a slight lead when the driver of the other car miscalculated and lost control.
The car went into a flip and because the driver was not wearing his seat belt and had his window open he involuntarily exited through the window about three feet above the ground and simply landed on his knees, as neat as you like, and skidded across the grass with the car arcing above him.
We looked back in shock to see him on his knees with his arms in the air with a “Noooooooo!” expression on his face as we all watched his car flip end over end over end into the trees.
The guy was obviously physically alright and our driver said, “Holy Fuck!” and we just kept on going.
In the right lane at about 70 mph, I was VERY rapidly overtaken on the expressway by a crotch rocket in the far left lane that slowed to my speed. The rider then put his feet straight up in the air with his forearms on the handlebars. Another bike came up and that rider did the exact same thing. When they eventually put their feet down, they pulled wheelies before speeding off to disappear in seconds.
Many years ago, I was sitting on a bar stool and the person next to me looked familiar. After I said something to him about maybe having gone to the same school, he pulled a handgun and aiming point blank at my stomach, pulled the trigger. Though it misfired, I’ll never forget the feeling in my gut. My brother grabbed his gun hand and beat it on the floor until he dropped it, subdued and held the drunk until the police arrived.
At certain spots in my middle school, a freeway overpass could be seen. One day during lunch time, there was apparently a collision on the overpass involving a gas tanker. All I saw/heard at the time was a gigantic fireball suddenly appearing on the freeway.
Another time, when I was growing up near LA, the area behind my house was rolling hills of brush. One night, there was an escaped convict in the area, and helicopters with giant searchlights were poring over the hills, including our backyard. Never heard of anything beyond that, not sure if they ever found the guy.
I was nearly hit by a high speed chase. The car was running at about 100 MPH. It was at 12:30 AM on a residential street. The only reason I pulled over was the ten police cars racing lights and sirens behind it. I pulled over and the bad guy blew by within a second. I was on my way to work, so when I got there, I got the story when the car crashed and they brought the driver in in shackles.
I saw a huge explosion; a gasoline holding tank at a refinery. I was driving home about 1:00 AM from a concert. The highway ran along one side of a river and the refinery was on the other side.
As I came abreast of the tank, it went BOOM! I had to stop, because the shock wave moved my car into the the other lane. I could feel the heat of the fire through the window.The fire ball reached about 100 feet in the air. It was winter and the temperature was around 0°F. As I drove away I could see the column of fire for miles.
When I got home I called the local radio station, but they had no idea. It was on the news the next day. It had been sabotage. No one was hurt.
A friend and I was on our way back home from a two day road trip. It was (again) late, maybe 1:00 am. We decided to stop at a Denny’ s on I-5 in central California.
The exit dipped down so the freeway was higher than the buildings. We were about half way down the exit when a car landed in front of us. They had intended to take the exit, but being very drunk, just went over the side. The car landed on it’s wheels and just stopped.
I ran to the car, pulled open the door and asked if everyone was ok. There were many people in the car, maybe 7 or 8. When I asked if they were all ok, the all said sure, how are you. None of them were even aware they had fallen 60 feet off the freeway. They also didn’t question how someone opened the door and looked in at 60 MPH.
So, maybe more a Cheech and Chong movie rather than action/adventure.
No, but a few months ago I really should have done. I was cycling to work and within the space of about 30 yards passed lots of crates of fruit and veg stacked up on the pavement and two workmen carrying a large pane of glass across the road. Much to my dismay, a high-speed car chase completely failed to send them all flying.
I once had two guys grab a fifteen hundred pound piece of farm equipment and lift the end of it high enough so they could pull me out from under it. They tried to repeat the feat later on, when their adrenaline wasn’t pounding, and failed.
I guess this was more of a Law & Order moment, than an action movie one, but I was riding my bike on a path that runs next to the Hudson River when I saw a body that had been pulled out of the river. I had to stop and walk around because most of the trail was blocked off with crime scene tape. There was no ambulance- just a man and a woman wearing suits with a uniformed cop. The guy looked like a mannequin. I guess he hadn’t been in there for too long.
You didn’t try to make sure he was punished for what he did? Jesus, if it had been me, I would have wanted to be there every step of the criminal justice process and try my hardest to ensure that the guy was charged with attempted murder and given the absolute maximum sentence - as well as sued his ass for causing me severe emotional trauma, which I would undoubtedly have if I was nearly shot in the stomach.
That’s if I could have restrained myself from beating the guy to a pulp right there with the nearest barstool.
My life went on, going to work every day. Hanging around a courthouse held no appeal for me back then. We had and have very strict handgun laws here, and the police and courts deal with it harshly.
When the drunk was thrown to the floor his head took a pretty good shot and his gun hand likely suffered severe damage from my brother’s repeated, adrenaline fueled smashing on the floor. I was OK with that, and sending him off to the tender mercies of jail.
It was dark and I watched a car leave the roadway a couple of hundred yards in front of me doing about 50 mph. I stopped and two people had been ejected from the car but were fine. The car was upside down on an embankment and they were pointing at the car and screaming in what I believe was Chinese. Myself and another couple of guys who had stopped got the idea and rolled the car up onto its side. There was a third person lying there under where the roof had been. I was sure he was dead. He wasn’t. I left but found out later that he was barely scratched. I don’t know how they all survived.
I was on the BW parkway this summer when a pursuit came up behind me very quickly. These guys were flying. I never even saw the car the were chasing. As I looked in my rear view mirror I watched a Baltimore police car, about three car lengths behind me, swerve and then go into the grass median and do a complete flip in the air, landing on his wheels in a cloud of dirt and weeds. It was just like something you’d see in the movies. I stopped and ran back expecting very serious or fatal injuries. The officer was dazed but, as I learned later, unhurt. The airbags didn’t even deploy. I was interviewed about what I saw a couple of weeks later. By that time I was second guessing myself thinking he just couldn’t have gone over the way I thought I saw him. After the interview the investigator confirmed it.
