I got a twofer. A few evenings ago I was waiting to make a right turn onto a busy street. One car was coming from the left, and the car behind it was turning onto the street from a lot. I figured I had enough time between the two because the second car was practically starting from a stop.
So I gun it and start to go, and immeditaely have to jam on the brakes because two jogging teenage girls have appeared on the sidewalk from the right, and were already swining over to jog past the front of my car.
Then I was stopped and made the second mistake. The girls were giggling and gestured for me to go and even called out, “Go on! Go on.” And they waved me ahead.
The biggest mistake was – I obeyed them. I forgot that it took few seconds to sort out who was going or waiting, and that the second car was accelerating all the time. And I didn’t look back to check how much space was left. The horn blared and I panicked and hit the brakes again, but I was too late and half into the lane.
Very lucky for me that the second driver saw what was happening and moved to the left lane, and there was no collision. Had there been, it would have been 100% my fault.
I saw a really good one the other day: a woman turning left onto another street cut the corner off and plowed head-on into another car sitting at the stop sign. A huge WTF? The driver who was hit jumped out of her car and began shouting at the idiot who cut the corner, insulting her parentage, etc. The other woman’s response: You don’t need to be rude; it was an accident! :rolleyes:
I was driving too fast for conditions on an icy 8-lane highway last February, with tires that were honestly past their expiration date. Tried to change lanes. My rear wheels lost traction, which is apparently the hardest kind of slide to recover from. I failed at it utterly. I spun out to the left, the front corner hit a concrete barrier. I spun in a kind of 270-degree turn and ended up with my rear bumper on the divider. **So **lucky that I didn’t hit another car with all the lanes I crossed, and neither I nor my car were hurt past the point of no return. My car was driveable and repairable, and I made it to work that day. I was only an hour late because the trooper had to reset my (I think) fuel pump. I don’t believe in god, but god bless that man. It was my first accident and I was so scared! But he was really nice.
So yeah. No other durps in my life can compare to that particular durp.
Most recent was stopping at a green light. I think it was the first time I ever got to that one when it wasn’t red, so my foot was on the brake without thinking about it.
Tried to make a left turn out of a side street onto the main road, without really registering that there was a car trying to make a left turn off the main road into my side street and that they therefore had the right of way. We nearly collided, and there was some angry waving from the other driver that was fully deserved. I did my best sheepish contrite face and mouthed “Sorry!” at them as we passed each other. Felt like a real moron.
Every few years, if I’m driving late when there’s next to no traffic, I’ll stop at a red stoplight, look both ways, and if there’s no traffic or all traffic is stopped, I seem to forget it’s a light and just proceed like a 4-way stop sign. Just did it last week taking my friend home from the hospital. Durrr. It had been a long day.
I’ve done this before too. The first time I had a passenger who asked me why I was stopping. The other time, I only realized my mistake when the light turned red. :smack:
It’s not very recent but I just blew through a red light one day and cannot a explain why. I wasn’t on the phone or tired or eating. Just zoned out for no good reason and realised it at the last moment.
It’s not one particular move, its two things I need to stop doing. The first is a multilane stoplight where the far left gets a turn arrow. If it’s a long light i’ve zoned out fiddling with the radio or my phone and i’ll see the car to my left move forward out of the corner of my eye and then i’ll start to go as well and then stop halfway into the intersection.
The other is just getting distracted in the car. I have my phone on a dash mount but it’s still dangerous to try and look at a text or check Waze for incidents ahead.
Stopped at a stop sign and sat, and waited, and sat, and waited…
for it to turn green. :smack:
After about three cars had backed up behind me and it became obvious that I was having a ‘brain fart’, the guy directly behind me finally honked his horn and my brain rebooted.
Last week I changed lanes on the freeway right in front of a car that was in a blind spot. It was only dumb luck that I didn’t cause a horrific accident.
I was driving on a two lane, 55 mph highway that has a wide shoulder. The standard procedure on this road (everyone does it!) is if someone is turning left but waiting for cross traffic, you slow down but pass them on the shoulder.
There was a big truck in front of me making a left turn. As I was passing him on the shoulder, I realized he had a single telephone pole sticking maybe 15 feet off the back of the truck, which swung way into the shoulder as he made the turn. It came about an inch from smashing into my drivers side window. Could have easily killed me. Yikes.
I pulled into the McDonalds drive-thru line and put the car into neutral to get my money out. I look up and I had actually put it in reverse and was backing up. I’d gone about four car-lengths: it was pure luck that no one was behind me or that I hadn’t reached the end of the lot.
I encounter a lot of stop-and-crawl traffic on the DC beltway each day, and I often attempt to “climb the ladder”: get over to a lane that’s moving, then when that lane stops, move over to an adjacent lane that just started moving, then back again, and so on. A good theory, but in practice it’s almost always a bad idea.
Waiting to turn left out of work one day. There’s a turn lane in the middle of the lanes and a guy in a big truck was waiting to turn into the driveway I was coming out of. He waved at me to go ahead and as soon as I did I realized my mistake - *I couldn’t see the lane behind his truck. * I turned into the path of a car in that lane - they rightfully laid on the horn and I gunned it so thankfully no accident. But it scared the hell out of me and I learned my lesson.
The other week at a McDonald’s drive-thru, I placed my order, gave the cashier the money, and drove away. I realized what I’d done after about a half-mile and had to go back and sheepishly explain to the cashier that I left without getting my food.
Not to hijack the thread, but how do you think a ladder feels about being climbed? That’s how other drivers in your ‘ladder’ feel.
I don’t have a cite, but I believe the net effect of this kind of manouvre is to slow traffic overall, as it tends to involve more braking, which causes other people to brake. Sure, you might get there a minute or two earlier, but at everyone else’s expense.
Since my second (and last, so far) accident 6 years ago, where I was going too fast down a narrow road and was unable to stop in time when I encountered oncoming traffic, I always try to think about the consequences of my actions before carrying them out. Which we all do, of course, but it’s always good to scare yourself with the thought of what would happen if you rounded the next corner and were going to fast to avoid an unexpected obstacle. This keeps me somewhat in check, though my wife still says I drive too fast.
My first accident was caused by falling asleep at the wheel - equally stupid, and just as much an example of bad driving as anything else in the thread, if not even more so.
I really hope I’m not the only one who does this, because it’s such a dumbass thing to do, and I find myself doing it far too often. Not all THAT often, but even more than once ever is too much, and I’ve done it several times.
Between the driveway at my house and the parking places at work, at the store, etc., I’m almost always parked head-in, meaning I have to back out before I go anywhere. After a few decades of driving the act has pretty much reduced itself to simple muscle memory- turn on ignition, move the gear shift down one position from “Park” to “Reverse,” check mirrors, step on gas pedal. Which is all well and good… except for those occasional times I’m parked along a curb, or I’ve pulled through a parking lot space so I’m parked facing outward, e.g., times when I don’t need to back up and should just put the car in “Drive” and go forward. I can’t tell you how many times over the years I’ve surprised myself in this situation by hitting the gas and going backwards and having to hit the brakes hard- shit, I had just reflexively put the car in “Reverse” again. Did it again one day a couple weeks ago.
It is absolutely astonishing to me that I’ve never backed into another car, or worse, doing this. I still shiver at the memory of the time several years ago on a project when a co-worker was standing behind our truck, waiting for me to move it a little forward so we had more room to get our gear out. He had to jump out of the way as I started backing up. It was a really dangerous and humiliating fuck-up on my part. You can’t really apologize for something like that.
Last weekend we met to go have some family pics taken. At one point we were talking about grooming practices, my brother mentioned shaving and his 8yo* son piped up with “and not behind the wheel, this time! :D”
Turns out that Bro had taken to shaving while driving and stopped the practice after watching a news bit where they showed, among other practices that can cost the driver his license and a hefty fine, a dude shaving while driving on the highway. The Kidlet is very happy about this, because it scared him but he’d been told repeatedly not to question his elders when he brought it up.
Sometimes I wonder how did we manage to keep Bro alive long enough to reproduce.
*8y and 1 day, if you wanna be exact. Which I know you don’t, really, but I do.
But he was really nice.