Wherein a tedious 5 1/2 hour drive becomes a test of skill

[Sapphire Silk]

As I mention in my Estate Madness thread, I'm here in Maryland to help close down my parents home of 42 years.

The drive up from North Carolina is usually routine and predictable. I've made the trip so often, I know every rest stop and watering hole along the way, as well as where most of the speed traps are.

Still, the drive typically takes me 5 1/2 hours, and some stretches are particularly tedious. I had just left one such stretch to make the approach to Richmond, VA.

Traffic speeds don't change, but there are some tricky merges, especially with recent road construction. I sail through that challenge with a yawn.

That's when I notice this green mini pickup ahead of me. It has two pieces of brown furniture, one of which I see is an overstuffed chair (I think the other is an ottoman). Then I realize it is rocking back and forth in the truck bed.

Then I realize it is not tied down . . . by anything.

Then I realize it is tumbling out of the back of the truck bend and bouncing along the highway STRAIGHT AT ME!!!

I swerve to the left (I'm in the fast lane) and luckily am in a part of I 95 where there's still a shoulder to swerve into. The chair barely missed my right front bumper. I look in my rearview and see the chair SHATTER into the front end of the car behind me (who admittedly is tailgating). The shattered pieces fly into the car behind HIM, and both pull over into the shoulder to check the damage.

Green pickup moves along as if nothing happened.



I try to catch up to get the license plate but am unable to. I get the state police, describe what happened, and the exit he gets off on.

And then shake for several minutes as the adrenalin wears off.

Car Wars, anyone?

[ADeMartino]

Having a small pickup myself, I often have to put the tailgate down to haul large items. But, I also carry bungee cords, rope, and other means to secure the load because even a fairly small load can make those little trucks 'squat'. It never ceases to amaze me at how many people fail to understand that when the truck is tilted to the rear like that, the cargo tends to shift AFT as the vehicle travels over bumpy roads. At the very least, you should stop on occasion and check your load.

Loading a pickup truck involved more than simply tossing the item in. A fellow at a junkyard where I'd once bought a used transmission was amazed that I shifted the transmission up to the front of the bed rather than leave it at the back. Why? You don't have to accelerate hard, but you never know how hard you're going to have to stop - and 200-300 lbs of metal flying forward in a panic stop can just ruin your day. And yes, of course, it was secured.

The fellow driving the truck in your tale probably didn't even know he'd lost his load, or if he did, figured he'd best just keep moving rather than deal with the ticket. Either way, what a jerk.

Glad to hear you're okay, and nobody was seriously hurt. And the guy behind you? Excellent testimonial on why you should never tailgate. Even if you do have a car with the baddest-ass brakes around, you're still subject to your own response time - and you can't always see what's in front of the car ahead of you.

[Sapphire Silk]

Exactly.

The green pickup's tailgate was up. I think he just threw the stuff in there, and thought it's own weight would keep it in the truck.

He needs a serious refresher on high school physics, particularly the parts on wind sheer, and how air moves over objects; velocity; and gravity.

Brother and I both own pickups. We each have a bag filled with bungees and ropes that are always carried in the trucks with us in case we end up hauling something. We're both paranoid about stuff falling out and shifting in an open bed.

[Teskeria]

Brother and I both own pickups. We each have a bag filled with bungees and ropes that are always carried in the trucks with us in case we end up hauling something. We're both intelligent enough to know about stuff falling out and shifting in an open bed.

Fixed it for ya!

[HYHYBT]

That's worse than my dodging a flying folding chair in the same manner a while back on I-85 near the Mall of Georgia... though that one, being so light, horizontal, and folded up, might have sailed right up and through the windshield.

Glad you're OK; hopefully everybody else was too.

[Chromatix]

Heck, I have straps and bungees aplenty for the trailer I can attach to my *bicycle*. Officially I'm not supposed to exceed 15mph while towing that.

[kpzra]

Driving back from Ft Benning to Michigan after seeing (now) hubby I had a piece of wood fly off a truck and take out the radiator in my rental car...in St Louis at 5:30 pm. I had no idea where I was and pulled over as much as I could. I managed to get to the exit and to a parking lot to wait for the tow truck. The driver took my call first, as I was in one of the worse areas and a lone traveling 22 y/o female. I was wondering what was up when he told me to get into the truck and lock the door, then he told me. The day before there had been a few random murders and the killer was still on the loose.

[protege]

He needs a serious refresher on high school physics, particularly the parts on wind sheer, and how air moves over objects; velocity; and gravity.

Quite a few people locally...either don't understand, or care about such things. Just about every day, I see some idiot with an unsecured load in the back of their truck. In fact, one such load nearly had me total my grandmother's car a few years back.

She had taken a trip up to my uncle's, and I was watching her house for the weekend. While she was away, I washed her car inside and out, and since she rarely drove outside of town...thought I'd "blow out the cobwebs" with a quick trip to the next town over. Nothing really unusual, in other words. That is, until I was returning home.

Heading south on I-79 out of Washington, I nearly totaled her car. I was heading up the massive hill past the I-70/79 split, and was in the passing lane. I usually get in the left lane on that hill, to avoid the semis plodding along at 35mph. I came over the hill, was coming down the other side, and then it happened...

About a dozen car lengths ahead of me, was a beat-up black pickup, with some sort of BBQ grill in the back. Didn't think much about it, but then I remembered that mine subsidence had caused a nice dip in the road! That idiot hit the dip at about 70mph, bouncing the grill out of the bed Pickup swerved into the median and nailed the brakes, while the car immediately to his right swerved onto the shoulder. I'm still doing about 70, and since I had a car to my right...the only thing I could do, was to slam on the brakes and hope that I could stop in time.

I'm still trying to figure out how I managed to stop. Even with ABS, have you ever seen a 1995 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera sedan stand on its nose? Seriously, I didn't stop shaking until that car was carefully back in its garage. Not only would my grandmother have kicked my ass for wrecking her car...but so would my mother!

[bhskittykatt]

Glad you were okay. If I had seen a recliner coming at me like that...I'd need new pants afterward!

Hubby has two pickups that both have plenty of cargo straps ready to tie down anything and everything, even in the Death Trap (which doesn't do interstate speeds, because it's a POS).

If it's something relatively small and heavy (lawn mower, pressure washer, etc), and we're just putzing around town, it's usually fine to just lay in the truck (as long as you can prevent whatever you're putting in there from rolling). If it's larger (like a recliner), or if you're going on the friggin interstate with that sort of wind sheer factor, then for goodness sakes you should know to tie it down!

[mharbourgirl]

Quite a few people locally...either don't understand, or care about such things.

This. Oh, so this.

I am a paranoid freak on the roads these days, and I'll tell you what gives me anxiety attacks when I'm driving. Trucks/vans with ladders on them.

Why?

Because, on February 17, 2000 (my 30th birthday, btw), I became a brain injury survivor. My MIL's driving is partly at fault, but the real blame goes to a ladder that fell from an insulation company's van and was lying in the middle of the lane as we came around the curve on the highway at 100 km/hr. There was black ice, and it was that grey hour just around sunrise. Mums saw the ladder and instead of just slowing down and driving over it, she panicked and jerked the wheel very hard.

She lost control of the car and we ended up in the ditch with the car totalled. I had a severe concussion, and I was the lucky one. MIL nearly bled to death from a 20-cm gash across the top of her head before the ambulance got there. We're both fine now, relatively speaking, but my short-term memory has never been the same and I am terribly uncomfortable if anyone but me is driving.

The company whose name was on the ladder refused to acknowledge any responsibility, claiming they hadn't used such ladders in at least 5 years. Which is bullshit, because it was a generic 12-ft aluminum stepladder. The police couldn't be bothered to do anything about it. My lawyer said my only option was to sue my MIL so her insurance would pay out, but seriously? Sue my MIL? She's poor as a church mouse, and I actually love her, so the only thing that would have accomplished is to create a horrible, unrepairable rift in the family.

So yeah, I'm a little bitter. And did I mention paranoid? I have many times changed my route because I found myself behind a vehicle with a ladder on it. This causes me long detours sometimes, but I don't care. I can't think when I see a ladder on a truck, all I can do is get away from it. Tie your shit down, people, and tie it THOROUGHLY. You can kill people if you don't.

[Raveni]

Tdhehd?

That's what car insurance is for! If my insurance company didn't pay for injuries to my daughter, I'd be suing them, and wouldnt mind my daughter doing whatever she needed to do.

[Sapphire Silk]

The company whose name was on the ladder refused to acknowledge any responsibility, claiming they hadn't used such ladders in at least 5 years. Which is bullshit, because it was a generic 12-ft aluminum stepladder. The police couldn't be bothered to do anything about it. My lawyer said my only option was to sue my MIL so her insurance would pay out, but seriously?

I might have sued the company anyway, and demanded they prove they sold that ladder, and argued if they sold it they should have removed their company name from it. At the least, it might have gotten the attention of their insurance company.

Tdhehd?

That's what car insurance is for! If my insurance company didn't pay for injuries to my daughter, I'd be suing them, and wouldnt mind my daughter doing whatever she needed to do.

I don't blame her for not suing the MIL. MIL's insurance premiums might have skyrocketed, especially if she were partly at fault and didn't live in a no fault state.

I might have sued myself, and framed it to the family, "It's the only way to pay for my hospital bills, and MIL's driving is partly to blame." But I don't blame anyone for NOT choosing that route and choosing to preserve family.

Update!

I passed the accident scene on the way home today. The shattered remains of the chair are still visible on the side of the road. I think I'll write a LTE of the local paper and see if the victims try and contact me. I'm curious to know if they caught the guy.

[HYHYBT]

Even with ABS, have you ever seen a 1995 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera sedan stand on its nose?

Mine didn't happen in a Cutlass Ciera, but it was in a 1995 Oldsmobile. Good brakes, that car had.

[Jay 2K Winger]

I've had to dodge stuff detaching from vehicles on I-95 before. I've related this story, but I'll relate it again.

I was going up to Philadelphia to attend a Ring of Honor wrestling show, with my friend Sam. At the time, Sam had aspirations of becoming a pro wrestler himself, and we were bouncing ideas around for gimmicks. He was in the midst of describing a gimmick he called "Tragedies over time" wherein his character-- whom we dubbed 'The Atrocity'-- would dress up like infamous 'bad guys,' and he specifically mentioned the Columbine shooters and Nazi gestapo, ignoring my protestations that "that is really not a good idea."

While this conversation has been taking place, I'm driving behind a vehicle towing a small trailer, one that looked almost hand-made. It had wooden sides and had a lid that had been secured down badly with one point of contact in the middle of the lid. Making matters worse, the hinge on the lid was at the BACK of the trailer.

As anyone with a basic knowledge of physics may have predicted, the wind from the vehicle's movement was catching under the lid, which was only barely hanging on. Sure enough, as I watch, the lid finally flaps backwards and the hinges snap like twigs.

Since I'd given myself plenty of room, I swerved onto the shoulder to avoid the lid, then back onto the road and got out from behind the trailer. Sam had gone quiet when this happened, then looked skyward and said, "Okay, God, I get it, it's a bad idea!"

[dalesys]

We need to have Maria's dad beef up our bumpers with a little rebar and cement so we can survive the idiots.