Please post here your experience of white-knuckled, heart-pounding story from the driver’s seat…:eek: [to the Googol power]
I once skidded 180 degrees on a slippery road near the coast on Palos Verdes Peninsula! The roadway had many turns in that area so I could have been broadsided.
Also, I ionce hit a police car! No injuries, and no citation…
I was driving south out of San Francisco in the heart of commute hours, early in the morning. There was rain coming down so hard you could barely see three cars ahead of you. But everyone was doing 65 mph anyway. The highway was at least four lanes across. Well, I’m toodling along in the left lane when I notice a change in the lights ahead of me and to the right, maybe brake lights? It was hard to tell through the rain, so I lifted my foot off the accelerator and leaned forward, trying to see what was going on. All of the sudden I see the broadside of a car right.in.front.of.me. The world slowed to a crawl as I realized this car was in an spin, hydroplaning like hell. The car spins off the highway and ends up facing the right direction, about a foot or two into my lane. I had time to gently turn the steering wheel to the right, passing the car with probably about two inches to spare. Then I drove to work, trying not to hyperventilate.
Mrs. Blue Sky and I were in Atlanta about 10 years ago and were heading south on I-285. We were in the next-to-outside lane when an 18-wheeler barely tapped the driver’s side rear quarter panel of our 1984 Jetta. We were doing about 75mph and got sent into a spin. We were heading towards the concrete barrier when a man driving a Honda Accord came zipping towards us. He glanced off the passenger side of our car and stopped us from spinning and from hitting the barrier. Luckily, traffic was relatively light (it was about 9:45am on a weekday). We were able to get off the roadway with no trouble and no injuries. The truck driver stopped about a mile down the road and came back as did the Honda driver.
The damage to our car was ridiculously minor: a snapped off bumper cover, a minor dent, and a broken side marker light. Our bumper did a number on the Accord, though. It put a 3" deep, 6" wide gouge along the entire passenger side. The sad part was that the guy had just bought the car the previous week.
We ended up getting about $1600 from the insurance company.
I was on the phone with my wife once, when she was in a horrible accident. We were both driving, and when it happened, I heard all the gory details before the line went dead. White with fear, I sped away to where I thought she was - we were on the same highway, 10 miles apart - by the time I reached where she was I saw a line of cars and a mess on the highway. I sped down the shoulder, past everyone, jumpedf rom my car and found my wife sitting on her bumper unharmed. I hugegd her so hard she had to tell me to ease up. The cop that was behind me gave me a hard time about riding so fast on the shoulder. I paid him no attention.
I’ve never heard anything so horrid as my wife getting into a terrible accident, and for 3 seconds hearing all the screams, crunches, and booms then dead silence…
Her phone broke incidently…
When I was about 19 and very stupid, I bought a 2 litre twin cam injected Toyota coupe: this thing was fast for its day. There’s a local stretch of road called the Scenic Drive, which winds up through the hills and the bush: very Sega Rally - narrow and twisty, all bush clad hills, swooping curves, tight bends, and long straights. It runs about 20k from end to end, and is very popular with boy racers.
I take my new car for a spin, and plant the boot - let’s see what she can do - road’s quite slippery in the shade, since the dew hadn’t burnt off yet - neoww! - coming up to a tight hairpin - brake sharply and chop down to third. Shit! Going too fast! Time slows down - I can feel the back end sliding out, and there’s nothing I can do. The car goes into a 720 degree spin - with a sheer clay bank on one side and a dropoff cliff on the other. The one thought that flashes through my mind is, “Oh, fuck. I’m going to die now.”
By sheer dumb luck there are no cars coming either way, since there’s no way anyone could have seen me and stopped in time: I somehow miss plunging off the edge or wiping out on the bank and restart the car, drive up and stop a little further on, and get out to check for damage and wait for my heart to return to normal.
The car was fine, except for a red smear of clay right across the front bumper where the car had kissed the bank so gently I hadn’t even felt it: another foot or so, and it would have taken the front of the car clean off. I slowed right down after that, especially since a friend of my brother was killed a couple of weeks later in his new car at exactly the same spot.
I was barrelling along a busy road in my 1968 VW Beetle, when suddenly the car was abuzz with wasps. Dozens of wasps. They seemed to have come from out of nowhere. When I pulled off the road and investigated, I discovered that there was a large wasps’ nest attached to the back of the passenger’s seat. I often parked the car with its windows open a bit, to keep it cooler. Apparently wasps had gotten in and started a colony, and I didn’t notice until they all emerged at once. This may not sound very scary, but the suddenness of it nearly caused me to veer into oncoming traffic.
In Carlisle, Pennsylvania, Interstates 76 and 81 cross, but there’s no interchange. You have to drive a mile on the regular streets to get between the two, and every trucking company has a huge base of operations around there. That place gets more truck traffic than anywhere in the country. While I worked there (for a software company, oddly enough), they rebuilt that mile of road, with fourteen-inch-thick concrete.
Leaving work on New Year’s Eve; it’s dark, and I’m in my tiny MG. I’m cruising along in the left lane, the light ahead turns yellow and I’m just on the borderline of making it so I step on the brakes. Behind me I hear something. In my rearview mirror I can see lights that are about as high as the roof of my car, and they’re shuddering up and down so I know the guy has got his brakes locked. I let up off the brake pedal just enough to stay in front of him. By the time we stop, his front bumper is at the white line for the intersection, and I’m just a carlength across. I wait, the light turns green, and I continue home.
And it didn’t even scare me. I’m a very good driver, I kept my wits about me and it was no big deal.
About six months ago, I was stopped at a red light on a drizzly night. Someone comes around the corner too fast and skids right at me. I’m unable to move any direction more than about six inches and there’s nothing between me and the skidding car except a manhole cover. The edge of that manhole was just enough to pinball the car away from me and aim it more or less in the right direction down the road.
I can’t drive, but a couple of days ago my friend was driving me home at around midnight when out of nowhere a black car speeds past us and is shortly followed by a tan car. She had no idea anyone was behind her- we were driving through the suburbs at night on back roads, so she had stopped checking in the rearview mirror for other cars since the streets were pretty empty. She was a little shaken up since the cars had been going so fast and were close enough that you could feel the car shake. The two idiots were obviously drag racing around town, and we passed them a couple more times.
Anytime my older sister was behind the wheel…
One winter (I’d say it was either 1995 or 1996), I was commuting to Blackhawk Community College in Moline, IL. If you are heading to campus from the south, there is a gigantically steep hill that you have to climb before you can plateau and enter into the parking lot. It was one of those snowy mornings where the roads are already slippery enough to put you on edge when I got to the stoplight at the bottom of the hill. It turned green and we all started our ascent up the hill. I’d say that there were probably 10 or more cars in a line climbing slowly up the hill at the time. I notice that it’s gotten very slippery, so I start to gun it a little bit a more to make sure that I’m still okay. As long as we are still moving at that pace, I’ll make it to the top and alll will be good. But then … someone at the top crest of the hill stops. I try to slow down, but I can feel it slipping and I’m just waiting for that top car to slide back and start a major chain reaction. Luckily, I had just enough room in front of me that I was able to floor it into the right line and go around. Even with it floored, I topped out at about 10 miles an hour. Also luckily, no cars slid backward, but for a moment it was pretty touch and go.
Lethbridge!! That’s where I’m from!
When I was 16 and had no sense, I decided to see how fast my 74 Dodge Dart would go. I got it up to 84 mph on a gravel road before I panicked and slammed on the brakes. I spun completely around twice and ended up with my passenger side about 2 inches from a very large and sturdy tree.
Recently, I’ve been having even scarier experiences. My son gets his learner’s permit in a few months and I’ve been letting him drive his car around the field at my dad’s house. Talk about white-knuckle.
I was travelling north on the Pacific Highwayand was approaching a truck doing about 100 kph. I was going about 110 and a car coming up behind me was going even faster. I knew that ther ewas an overtaking lane ahead and just kept going. I changed lanes and pulled around the truck as did the guy behind me. When I was alongside the truck, with someone tearing up behind me (obviously planning to pass me when I pull in infront of the truck) and some idiot going the other way pulls out and starts overtaking a line of cars in the belief that the overtaking lane isa on his side of the highway.
By the time it became obvious that this idiot was not going to cede his belief that he had the overtaking lane the car behind me was tailgating me at 110. I had a moment to think that when I slammed on the brakes he would run straight up the back of us but I stood on the brake pedal and he just stayed 6 feet behind me, the truck pulled clear and I fell in behind it with a few yards to spare from a head on collision.
I was so sure that we were stuffed - if the guy behind didn’t brake, if the truck braked at the same time, that I couldn’t continue driving after the next town for some time.
About 25 years ago, I lived in Brooklyn Park, just outside the Baltimore city line. I worked at the Pentagon. It was winter and we’d just had one of those coat-everything-with-a-sheet-of-ice storms during the night. But I was a dedicated young Naval officer and I figured once I got off the side roads and on to the Baltimore-Washington Parkway, my commute would be a piece of cake.
Slowly and carefully, I got to the parkway, where traffic was barely moving - the surface was solid ice. Putt-putting forward ever-so-slowly, I was sure it’d clear any second, but after a good 30 minutes and barely making it a mile down the road, I decided it was time to take the next exit and return home. I could see the exit, a few hundred yards ahead. I started, ever-so-gently to move my Chevette to the right. Did I mention it was a 5-speed?
That’s when the spin began.
It felt like slow motion because it was slow motion. I was in the middle lane, rotating to the right. I was alert enough not to jam on the brakes or try to steer. I just sat there as the car spun, wondering what this episode would do to my insurance rates. It was a relief when I was spinning through 180 and I saw there was plently of space between me and the cars behind, and they were barely moving, too. The car continued around until I was facing forward again, and I gave it the slightest bit of gas and a nudge towards the shoulder.
Miraculously, it obeyed. With my right tires on the shoulder, I had a bit of traction, and I exited. As it happened, the surface streets, by that time, were not as slick. But I went home, called my boss, and resolved never to do anything that stupid ever again. To this day, I can see the scene as I spun slowly till I was facing the road behind me… :eek:
I was heading home recently when I spotted a car with its high beams on. I gave it the courtesy flick of the headlights to let them know. I don’t know if the driver was drunk or just pissed off that I’d flashed my lights but he swerved into my lane and headed straight at me. I swerved to the right, we passed, and I drove on wondering “What the hell was that about?”.
Driving through a strange city during a torrential thunderstorm at night with my Mom at the wheel is probably the most terrified I’ve ever been for an extended period of time. I was in the driver’s side passenger seat and there were cars flying by in the opposite direction * much * too close for comfort.
Ever get caught in a hailstorm in your car? In winter 1979, I was driving home from Rolling Hills Estates, northbound on Narbonne approaching PCH. The hail started. It was like thousands of marbles clattering on the roof of my 1970 Squareback!
omg! omg! omg! omg!
This is my worst driving fear multiplied by 1000!
Did you get stung? I would’ve been f.r.e.a.k.i.n.g.o.u.t. completely! There would’ve been no pulling off the road; I would’ve caused a massive pileup.
I’m gonna have nightmares now.
I just got a couple of stings, one on my face and one on my right hand. The worst of it was the surprise factor. If somebody had said “Hey, in a couple minutes we’re gonna release some wasps,” I’d have been able to deal with it. Wasps don’t really upset me very much; I am not allergic to their stings or anything like that. But nobody wants to see a big batch of wasps just show up out of the blue.
I was driving home from a weekend of camping on a two-lane highway. I noticed someone in the distance in the opposite lane was passing a slower-moving vehicle. They seemed kind of close, so I gently applied my brakes to serve as a kind of warning to the people behind me that I may be stomping on them… shortly.
The car that was passing came closer, closer, taking his sweet time passing the other car. Finally, when he was 10 yards (give or take) away from me, I slammed on my brakes. He barely ducked into the other lane in time. I estimate our vehicles to have been less than two feet apart at that moment.
Ladies and gents, if you must pass that car while traveling on a two-lane highway, GUN IT! You can slow down again when you’re back in your own lane. I’d rather see you speeding (not that I’m of the position to do anything about that, but if I were…) than see your facial expression when you realize you might hit me.