Close Calls and Lessons Learned

I was in the process of writing up a novel about all the details of the time I plowed into a snowy ditch at high speeds. I was 17, dumb, short-sighted and loved to drive. I think I’ll just get right to the point.

I was making up for lost time on a snow-covered country road, which resembled more like skiing than it did driving. I was cut off by an oblivious driver and was forced to hit the brakes to avoid them. But unfortunately, I lost the counter steering game and plowed into a ditch where I very narrowly avoided slamming into a giant tree, one of only a few along that road, but one that would probably have concluded my existence.

My car encrusted into the scenery, I crawled out of the driver side window and onto the road, where I called my dad, knowing full on that he would never be able to pull my Golf out with his 1992 Dodge Caravan SE. The ditches were deep, my Volkswagen was 6-feet under.

Nobody drives on that road. Not at 2:00 AM. I was very surprised there was even another driver there to cut me off.

But all of a sudden, a convoy…I kid you not…a convoy of SUVs driven by band members who had just recently ended a show in a nearby town slowed and stopped at my misfortune. They tied rope to a Durango on one end, my little hatchback on the other and yanked me out of the tomb my car had made.

After profusely thanking them for their help, they only asked for me to come see them at one of their shows. Shamefully, I didn’t even remember the name of the band the next day, but I vowed to pay it forward and offer my help to anyone who needed it.

It was odd weather for San Diego, a mere drizzle compared to anywhere else; but most significantly, it was the first rain in nearly 7 months. The roads were greasy and festooned with SoCal’s hysterically poor drivers. After having warmed up my 89 Toyota MR2, I chugged my coffee and left for an interview as if I was running late. There’s not a single drivers aid that could have interrupted this moment of “experimental” driving. I drove rather modestly through the congestion to a freeway onramp where I noticed a brake in traffic. I yielded to look left and right, to and fro. A blip of the throttle and into second gear I coasted to the 80 degree right turn. I put my foot down, broke the tires loose, and began to slide in a elegant and balanced drift. Distracted by my own driving, I overlooked the highway patrol officer parked on the left side of the onramp. Not in the most opportune moment to brake, I held the skid until I was parallel with the officer. The car snapped straight, and as I pear to the left, pail with the expectation of being pulled over, I saw the cop starring down at his lap :p. I darted on to the freeway fleeing the scene of the crime, laughing as if I just cheated death. And as I carried onward to my interview, still grinning with pride, a gentleman, a witness in a Prius, honked and gave me the coveted double-thumbs-up!.. I didn’t get the job.

“Drive tastefully”

I had two big ones less than a year apart in ’08-’09.

Driving my trusty ’99 Miata on I-81N through VA one August evening, I was the last of a line of cars passing a pair of slower tractor trailers on the two-lane highway, and the rear one had just begun signalling to come over though a few much faster cars remained to pass before it was clear. As the car ahead of me came abreast of the trailing trailer’s tractor (as it were), he started coming over. Now I was just passing the rear tires and by the time it sunk in that he really meant it, was right in Fast and the Furious zone without the movie magic that would let me drive straight under the trailer. I could have braked but in some combination of natural aggressive inclination and instinctual thinking that it was too late to brake, I gave it all she had, got as far left as I could but there wasn’t more than two feet of shoulder. It was almost enough. Almost. Tagged in the right rear wheel, saw very large headlights through my right window (I was fortunately alone), knew the certainty of death, and… struck the second, leading truck in the morbidly named “Jayne Mansfield bar” which grabbed my front right wheel and swung me straight. The airbag went off in my face (my only, superficial injury was a fat lip), and in a daze I locked up all four brakes as I was drug down the road, finally breaking free when I got my wits back together and realized I was attached and let off the brakes. I told the 911 operator that I was in a Miata and got tag-teamed by two semis, but insisted I was fine. They didn’t believe me and sent the paramedics anyway. The truck driver who hit me told the responding officer he had seen me but he had “waited long enough” with his signal on. I might have gone after him legally but I was A) too busy being glad to be alive and B) leaving the country to pursue a Masters and my dreams the next week. Conveniently removed the necessity of having to sell that car. After being driven by me for several years through an untold number of less spectacular close calls, it had earned its wings. I remain convinced that if I had braked when he first started coming over i wouldn’t have been clear in time and would have gone right under the rear wheels, shredded, dead.

Next June I was riding a ’98 Triumph Trident from Southampton, UK to Le Mans, France for… you guessed it. Coincidentally I’m wearing the shirt today, but I came near enough to not getting it. This story is much simpler, but with the previous incident still fresh in my memory, was similarly deeply affecting. I had taken curvy back roads most of the way from the ferry terminal at Le Havre and once out on the highway, having cleared some traffic blockage with nothing but straight road ahead, I decided to see what she’d do. This day I learned a thing or two about motorcycle suspension and frame dynamics, and the ins, outs, and offs of head shake. At somewhere north of 120mph, the handlebars began to oscillate. Just slightly at first, but worryingly, no countermeasures improved the situation. This developed slowly enough that I was able to try everything I could think of. I knew jumping on the front brakes and shifting the weight forward was supposed to be a bad idea. I tried giving it gently a little more throttle, I tried gently letting off the throttle, tried a little rear brake and a little front brake. The head shake slowly but unstoppably increased. Eventually I had drifted down to about 90mph, the shake was ferocious, and it became clear, I was going down, I had better get going as slow as I could before the inevitable happened. I got on the brakes moderately hard and soon the shake was terminal, throwing the bike and I down on our right sides. I found myself street-luging along at highway speed, feet first, watching my bike spinning along flat on its right side ahead of me, jetting sparks and as I would notice later, lots of fuel. We both finally ground to a stop and I had some 100′ to jog to catch up to the bike (which was of course my first concern.) With a wave of traffic approaching I was intent on getting out of the way before a bad situation got worse but the French drivers were attentive and likely watched this whole tom-foolery go down. I didn’t speak a word of French and none who stopped had any English to offer, but one friendly character was kind enough to help me get the bike back on two wheels and out of the road. The only English the police had for me was “Drinking?” to which the answer was fortunately no (though the following weekend was another story), and a tow truck and a cab later I was setting up my tent in the dark at Karting Nord, just inside the Porsche Curves. The bike was towed home thanks to insurance but was only a rear brake lever away from being rideable and took me another few hundred miles before I sold it to return to the states.

Have I learned my lesson? Perhaps enough? I now commute on two wheels nearly every day and have survived another few years. I’m still driven by driving and living on the edge, but I have no illusions about the proximity of that very small and tenuous line between 10/10ths and mortality.

Fortunately I haven’t been involved in any serious or possibly life-threatening scenarios in a car (yet). The closest I’ve come was when I drove past a parking lot at approximately 20 mph and a car decided to back out right in front of me and clipped the right rear wheel and quarter panel as I swerved. It would obviously have been worse hadn’t I reacted or if there would have been an oncoming car, but at 20 mph I would only have gotten serious nose bleed and maybe a black eye (was driving a modern station wagon).

There has obviously been some heart stopping moments with trucks overtaking in a blind curve when pitch black outside etc., but to this day, I’ve been fortunately exempt from accidents even though I belong to the “most dangerous” group of drivers.

However, I mainly just wanted to complement on the article. Very engaging read although one of the darker subjects within the passion for automobiles.