Life is precious, when you see it taken away in the blink of an eye it is traumatic.

40 years working in emergency services I've seen my share messed up stuff. Trying to figure out how to walk away..

I fail to understand the people who have to drive with their front bumper up my rear. The left lane people that think they own the road and there is no speed limits. Everyone is just in their way.. Those same people who can't follow anyone doing the speed limit on two lane. So have to come at me head on in my lane while passing. It makes them such better drivers if I have to brake for them. Happens regularly on one stretch of road I drive.
I guess Im just a bit jaded. Seen to many of the innocent pay for some one else being selfish and reckless. Not just limited to driving either, seems so many people only worry about themselves.

Rant over.
Be safe watch out for the other guy. Their not watching out for you.

Mac

"Never Forget Which Way Is Up!"

Ironic that I saw this post,,, I had an extremely close call a few days ago… had someone playing nascar, passing me on a curve and just barely barely got back in the lane before the oncoming semi in the opposite lane.
I still don’t know how he managed to get in his lane….and he/she wasn’t a bit rattled either… kept flying down the road…. Walking off and leaving me,,, had to be in excess of 90 mph.
As stated above,,, keep your eyes peeled for the other guy… they are not paying attention to you

I came really close to being killed last week on I 80. As I was coming up on an exit, a woman in front of me decided she wanted to exit, but had gone past the ramp. She braked hard, and came to a dead stop in the right lane. I about pushed the brake pedal through the floor to get stopped from the 70 mph speed, the truck behind me couldn’t get stopped, swerved hard to the right and onto the exit ramp. He came close to rolling his rig on the ramp. Total idiocy on the woman’s part.

Huge part of all these is driving too fast. Speed kills. Too many examples to list them all, but common theme among all of them is/was "driving too fast".

After being a Fireman/EMS for over 25 yrs you never get use to it. After 100's and 100's of run everyone we rolled up on. Very few was a surprise, you knew the out come on most of them. The Children were the worse. So much life to give and not given a chance because of poor decision. I could live the rest of my life and never come up on a accident and I would be happy.

Was on my way home yesterday and came upon a flock of car haulers cleaning up what looked to be a 6 car pile up. Best guess was car 1 came up on a line of cars stopped at a light. Came to an abrupt stop. Car 2 following too close for speed then hit car 1. Car 3 hit car 2. Car 4 hit car 3. Car 5 hit car 4 and car 6 hit car 5. Car 1 had a stove in trunk. Car 6 stove in front end. All rest damaged front and back. Idiots driving like it is a NASCAR event. The old rule of 1 car length per 10 mph speed long gone. It now seems to be 1 to 2 car lengths regardless of speed.

I normally drive posted speed limit to plus 5 mph over and it is rare that I can go anywhere that I don't end up leading a line of cars stacked up behind me. Have no idea how fast some of them would be going if not for me, but way too fast.

Required to attend a defensive driving course years ago and advice to deal with tailgaters then was to slow down. If they won't leave proper distance then best defense is to slow them down and I then leave lots of distance in front of me so if I have to stop, it won't be suddenly. It forces reaction time on them. Sounds counter intuitive, but have not been whacked myself, so may be working. Don't make many friends that way, but not looking for friends anyway.

I came upon two head on collison's two weeks in a row a few years ago, was first person there. First was a 29 year old guy slumped over the steering wheel in the middle of the road, he was room temperature, other guy's car was off down the hill from the shoulder, he had been ejected and was in a fetal position with his head in front of the front wheel, he was still alive but all boogered up no idea if he survived.

The next week a couple of young guys in a newer z 71 hit two old men to set tombstones in cemetary's, the 19 year old had worked all night and was afraid to make the long drive back home as he might fall asleep so had his buddy come get him, he was asleep in the passenger side when they hit. Both wrecks were from texting! 19 year old was air lifted and died a year later after he had got out of the hospital and was doing rehab to walk, etc. Wreck had dislocated his heart and he had damage to it from the wreck, year later he had a massive heart attack from it and passed away.

Cell phone's cause more wrecks than any drunk driver's ever did!

Thank God for every day above ground.

Few comments:

The new dash board screens that are in every new vehicle used to regulate everything are a hazard. Doesn't matter what is needed or wanted,( heat control, defroster, radio, gas mileage numbers or all the other crap that it is used for ), you have to take your eyes off the road to use it.

In my area, there are many long straight sections of roads. Some go for miles. Many white crosses along these roads. Speed and stupidity I suspect.

In Oregon, the speed limit for big trucks is 5 mph slower than passenger vehicles. Just causes long strings of vehicles with many trying to look around and passing on corners or many at a time. I usually just pull over and let them go if I have a long way to go. Take up the tail end and leave space for the next one to get around me. Many times the idiots get in front then turn off down the road a ways, or we all get to next town or light at the same time.