Chances are, the answer is "yes". In the US it is in the top 5 causes of death, with over 118,000 people dying of auto related accidents a year. Scary stuff.
Today I was in an accident. Everyone is fine, it was just a fender-bender. Still, I felt very bad about it as it was absolutely my fault.
One minute your listening to Talk of the Nation and the next your slamming in to the rear of the car in front of you. In a moments notice, everything can change. I blame Neil Conan.
Luckily I have never caused an accident that involved another car. However, I've had a couple of people run into me while I was waiting in traffic or to turn. By far, the worst situation I caused was this: I was driving to Chicago, going to get a visa for a trip to China. I was accompanied by ecib, actually. I was passing a semi-trailer in the right lane, and hydroplaned on a puddle of slush. ecib was in the passenger seat, and we slid under the trailer, him first. I was pretty sure we were going to be gravely injured or dead. Luckily, we spun a bit, and were kicked out from under the trailer, maybe because we hit the jack stands, or the hanging spare tire underneath. We then spun around some more, slammed into the median, and came to a rest. ecib was covered in shattered glass, but we were fine. The semi never stopped. I'm not sure he even knew what had happened. We called the cops, got the car towed, walked in the snow to the first L station into Chicago (which was just about 2 miles away), got the visa, and took a Greyhound bus home.
Yeah, I remember vividly sliding into the undercarriage of the semi, watching in slow motion through my window as the two vehicles met. I felt certain I was going to die. The lamest thing IMO was what my last thoughts would have been...just nothing really. I was just in shock staring wide-eyed and mouth agape like a fish on a dock. The closest feeling that was able to cut through the shock was a vague feeling of helplessness. I didn't even have a thought in my head, but if I did, the closest to what I was feeling would have been "this is lame." The car was so destroyed that the insurance company gave you a write down for the entire value of the vehicle. I remember showering the next day and finding bits of glass in my hair still. Besides that accident I've been rear ended three times. Two of those times were back to back two days in a row in two separate cars. I also rear ended I guy once leaving a parking lot. I caused no damage, and I was going less than 10 mph. The guy got out and was asking me all these questions about my speed. Turned out he was an engineer that worked on car bumpers and he was really curios about my speed from a data perspective. This shit is the scariest thing about riding a motorcycle to me. In every one of those situations, there is nothing the driver could have done to avoid being hit. The day I got rear ended the second time in a row, my sister had just come back from college and wanted to go to the mall. She was tired of driving, so I said I would. I remember joking that at least I won't get rear ended since I got that out of the way yesterday. It was almost comical how defensively I was driving. We were on a two lane road and the car in front was stopped for a left turn, and waiting for oncoming traffic to open up. I started a slow stop waaaaaaaaay sooner and more gradually than I ever have, and left plenty of room in between me and the car in front. Sure enough, BAM! Teen girl on her cell phone slams into us. Nobody was hurt except the cars, and she was terrified and balling her eyes out. I'm sure she was wondering why all I could do was laugh.
I've always felt bad about that. It was such a terrible moment of hopelessness.Yeah, I remember vividly sliding into the undercarriage of the semi, watching in slow motion through my window as the two vehicles met. I felt certain I was going to die. The lamest thing IMO was what my last thoughts would have been...just nothing really. I was just in shock staring wide-eyed and mouth agape like a fish on a dock. The closest feeling that was able to cut through the shock was a vague feeling of helplessness. I didn't even have a thought in my head, but if I did, the closest to what I was feeling would have been "this is lame."
Haha, I definitely hope you don't feel even .00001% bad on my account with some sort of weird guilt thing for putting me in that situation or anything. Complete accident, and Everything turned out great. Cool story, interesting perspective gained, got more than the blue book value of your car from insurance co, and still accomplished visa mission. If I had a magic wand I could wave and make it never have happened I wouldn't even want to do it one bit.
Dudes, I'm glad you made it out unscathed. This sounds like the sort of thing you see in a movie and think "that would never happen". mk, was this for the China trip that lead to meeting gq? If you were hurt it could have possibly prevented this, right? [edit] realizing that last sentence doesn't sound right. What I mean is that "preventing this" would be horrible. -To be clear. It's amazing what a moment can do. So glad you're not dead pal. You too ecib.
When I was 16 my dad bought me a 1983 Mazda RX-7, which was awesome. It took me all of 2 weeks to t-bone another driver and total my car, his car and a third which he skidded into. It was by far the worst feeling I've ever experienced. For a few minutes I didn't know if I had killed anyone, but based on the condition of the cars, I thought that was a strong possibility. The car I hit was fucked, crunched in on both sides and mangled to hell. By some good fortune, no one was hurt beyond some cuts and bruises. Despite it being 14 years ago, I can't drive by that particular intersection without thinking about it.
Yesterday I felt guilty simply because I knew I was going to be waisting large chunks of the people I hit's time. Insurance claims, auto-repair shop estimates, rental car etc. I can't imagine how bad I'd feel if they were hurt at all. I'm sorry you had to go through that. Glad you were okay. The place where I got in my accident at 16 is near my grandparents house. I take the same exit each time I go there and I am always reminded of it. It will never leave me. It's amazing how quickly it all happens but also how long it seems to last while happening. Each revolution my car made seemed like forever or in slow motion.
You have no idea how on the point you are. Especially for major accidents. Looking back it feels like it took hours because there are so many tiny details that stick out. Important stuff, unimportant stuff. Smells. Sounds. Voices. But all in all, it takes a few seconds at most to go from just another day to a really bad situation. Happened to me in 2004. Hit another vehicle that wasn't paying attention at an ungoverned merge. Still disturbs me to this day. It took perhaps a second from my reaisation that something was going to happen to it actually happening. A distance of maybe 10 meters.In a moments notice, everything can change.
I have experienced major time dilation four times that I can recall. First time I was 6 or 7, and pulled a 2 year old from the bottom of a public pool. Second time age 8, I was way out in our front yard, turned to see a large section of the backyard on fire around the neighbors trash-burning barrel, I ran and put it out with a shovel and a garden hose. Third time I was 16 and rolled a VW squareback wagon into a ditch, exactly as I had done in a dream 3 weeks before. Had the classic "Life passing before my eyes" scenario and after I stopped rolling just figured I was dreaming again. Fourth time was the impetus for the story I posted last night, where two truckers tried to murder me.
That story about the 2 year old is interesting. Was there no one else there?
Her mom was sitting a few feet away near the kiddie pool, yakking. I happened to be learning to swim and was jumping in near the steps and swimming to the side of the big pool. It was a typically crowded summer day, lifeguard was there, I did not see the baby fall in, just found her lying on the bottom, just past me and the steps. Her eyes were wide open and unblinking, she may have been slightly moving her arms and legs or it could have been the motion of the water. I dove down and lifted her out with my own head barely above water and shouting for help. She was revived. There was a lot of screaming from her mom and others, I was forgotten in the panic or else was in shock and don't remember anyone addressing me in any way. I do recall watching the crowd around her and hearing her cry. My parents never talked to me about this after I told them, I'm sure it contributed to my recklessness and general disregard for danger, having cheated death at the age of 7.
I gotta say you are kind of a badass. also you are now the first person I have followed.
I have gone on to save the lives of 10 people, myself included once in a near disaster that would have killed me, my sister, her husband and both of their children. I saved my Party Chiefs life back in 1976 or so, though at the time we did not discuss it, it was too immediate. He was nearly run over by a grader or patrol, long caterpillar with that wide blade beneath. It was backing on to him and I managed to shout above the noise of the machine, he jumped clear at the last moment. 20 years later after many a different job for me, in a crowd of fellow workers as we had our morning coffee, he pointed at me and said, "Yeah, that guy saved my life". It was good for me as I had many other experiences that near rivaled that one and had become detached for reason of sanity from my exploits. It was the first time he had acknowledged it.
Time is a strange thing in moments like that. You are forced out of any internal dialog and fully and completely in to the present moment. If you've not ever seen the movie Fearless with Jeff Bridges, I highly recommend it. There are people that get addicted to the extreme hyper-awareness and presence that situations like car accidents provide. This can account for the popularity of things like extreme sports -sky diving etc. About 6 years ago I was driving down the highway at about 70 mph when the hood of my car flipped up and smashed in to my windshield. Glass shattered all over and I struggled to maintain control of my vehicle in the ice and snow. I was fine, just some minor cuts and scratches and I avoided contact with all other cars. In total it lasted about 10 seconds but felt like an hour. I can still remember the smell and the taste of some of the particles from the hood that were in my mouth. Scared the shit out of me. aside: Have you ever noticed that time goes slowly in moments like that, when you are fully in the present moment? Conversely, time goes by quickly when you are "zoned out" or constantly in the state of mundane thought. Perhaps the key to a seemingly "long life" is to try and be present as much as possible.... without the need for an extreme situation. -Easier said than done, I think.
I think that the reason that time seems to go slowly at those times is the adrenaline. With it pumping through your brain, you think, and act faster. Survival instinct, I guess. Wouldn't be a nice way to live though. There's times when you want time to go fast.
It's definitely the adrenaline surge, combined with having the obligation to perform a task as the driver. I have been in several accidents and incidents on the highway but only experienced time dilation when I was the driver/rider and not the passenger.
Seems like a sound theory to me. After reading your piece about the trucks, it occurred to me that if racecar drivers have any hesitation or inkling of doubt, they're likely to become rickybobby-toast.
Ricky-Bobby running around on fire. best part of the movie. Ayrton Senna comes to mind, he did things with an F1 car that no one has matched. He was also bat-shit religious, but in a good way, he thought of himself as chosen, but kept fairly quiet about it. Along with that came no fear of death, to the point that his friends and family were concerned for him. Alain Prost tried to talk sense into him several times. The documentary "Senna" is on Netflix, good flick even for non-race fans. I have when riding at speed had stray moments of thought, that proved, sphincter-clenching. That's why I love riding, it forces you to be in the moment, and when I stop there is always that grin.
I have been in at least three accidents when it was my fault, all when I was a dumb teen. No one got hurt. I have been in several accidents when I wasn't at fault. Two of the accidents where I wasn't at fault were when I stopped on a yellow in Michigan, I believe that yellow means speed up in that state. One of the accidents when I wasn't at fault involved a guy going over 40 on a 25 mph street when I was backing out. He took the turn and put the pedal to the metal on a residential street filled with parked cars. It cut his wheels in half when he careened over the curb, he didn't have a seat belt on, he was badly injured but I never found out how bad. There was no way to know how fast he was going but the damage to his car and the other cars he flew off into was pretty severe. My car wasn't damaged very badly. I always felt like that accident was kinda my fault, but at the same time there is a reason that residential street has a 25 mile an hour speed limit and there was very little visibility for people coming out of driveways. The whole thing disturbed me more than any of the accidents where I was clearly at fault.
I speed a lot on freeways, but almost never on residential streets. Things like that are all too common, and really what can you gain by going 10-20 mph faster for the limited distance on which you normally travel on residential roads? Probably not more than a few seconds. I don't think most people have done the calculation. Obviously, a few seconds of your time isn't worth killing a kid whose basketball inadvertently goes into the street. I wouldn't say that that accident was your fault, because at 25-30 mph you can react to almost anything in time.
Luckily, I've never been involved in an accident. I know it's impossible to control others' actions on the road, but I think it's possible to minimize the potential for an accident by always driving defensively. I've been driving for over six years and have amassed over 120,000 miles on the road, and I've never so much as received a scratch on my car. I did have a few close calls when I was starting out driving -- like I suspect most drivers do -- but I was able to learn from all of those. I found that if you drive as if everyone else around you is an unpredictable, terrible driver, you'll likely end up being safer. You can predict what each car might do and be very situationally aware. The only time I was in any accident ever was in a school bus in high school -- someone thought they could beat the bus by pulling out at a side road while the bus was on the main road. The person in the other car didn't make it and scraped the side of the bus.
I agree that defensive driving is the way to go so long as it isn't confused with passive driving. Passivity will get you in to trouble on the road. Good luck out there, I hope your unscathed streak lasts your whole life.I've been driving for over six years and have amassed over 120,000 miles on the road, and I've never so much as received a scratch on my car.
Until this fender-bender I was in, I hadn't been in an accident involving another car since I was 16. I drive about 20-30k miles a year. I was distracted by a radio program. It was stupid and I've learned my lesson.
It's pictures of fender benders like this one which make me most nervous when I am riding on my motorcycle. At times I have ridden somewhat recklessly, but even if I am being an entirely safe and responsible defensive rider something as common as a fender bender could be the end of my life. It's scary. One big reason I wish Texas would legalize lane splitting. If I could crawl up to the front between two lanes when traffic is backed up at a red light I would be protected by a fortress of a steel. That it would ease congestion and shorten my ride time are nice bonuses too. I've only been one accident as the driver. Not at fault. Was sitting at a stop light in the far right lane with cars behind and ahead of me also at a stop when a distracted lady on a cell phone decided she needed to turn right and turned into my stopped car. Very low speed collision, no injury.
My recent accident was at very slow speed too. Still doesn't change the fact that I need a new fender and they need a new bumper and tail-light. Gotta say, the police officer was super cool and so were the people I hit. It was one of those experiences that I walked away from thinking, "you know what, humanity isn't half bad..".
I've been in two incidents, one my fault the other not. Theone where I was at fault was it was raining ridiculously and I made a bad decision on when to turn left. The other one, the other driver turned left at the wrong time and I was pushed into oncoming traffic and almost off the overpass.
Glad you were alright FS. When you were nearing the overpass was there enough time for you to think "holy shit I'm about to go over the wall"?
It was more a very steep slope then wall, but even the cop who took our info was amazed that I didn't go over. Wish I had a picture of it. Our family seems to have horrible luck with vehicles. My sister has gotten into two incidents, one her fault the other not. My mom's car has been in one where she was rear ended by a guy high on prescription meds, her car was totalled in a parking lot when she wasn't even near it, and when she lent the car to a friend they got into an incident as well. While my dad has another problem entirely; people like to break into his truck. Once it was stolen and used to haul illegal fish. They even ripped off the canopy of his truck with a forklift. His truck has been broken into so many times that any key will open the door and turn the ignition, and you can remove the key from the ignition and it will still run! People still try to break the window first, for some reason, while my car will sit not 5 meters away, unlocked and untouched.
My wife has had two bikes that I have gifted her stolen since I've known her. Some people just have horrible luck. Others just forget to lock their bike up ;-) P.S. How is married life?While my dad has another problem entirely; people like to break into his truck. Once it was stolen and used to haul illegal fish.
That is one of the most bizarre things I've read ini a while. What made the fish illegal? Does he still have the truck minus the canopy?
Because of a combination of poverty on native land and special fishing rights some people try to sell fish commercially without a license. They of course need vehicles to haul this illegal catch, and I guess using a stolen one is better then using one of their own. Some time I'll try to find a good article on the fights around fishing in BC, some interesting stuff there. Married life is awesome, btw. I feel like I could accomplish nothing else in life and still live without regret.
Married life is awesome, btw. I feel like I could accomplish nothing else in life and still live without regret.
That's nice to hear FS. Enjoy the honeymoon phase, if you're amongst the lucky it will last forever.
I've been very lucky, I guess. One accident, when I was 16 years old (late 1970's), none since. And the one when I was 16 was not my fault - oncoming driver turned in front of me. I did lay my motorcycle down a couple of times, both times on slick roads just after a light rain, but no contact with anything else. Almost forgot - about a year ago, I was rear-ended while stopped at a traffic light, but it was a pretty light tap, with no damage to my mighty Volvo's bumper, and just some scrape-marks on the other car. Glad to hear that you're okay.
I got in to a car accident the first week I had my license. I was showing off for a friend and ran a stop sign. My 8 year old sister was in the back seat. We were clipped on the drivers side fender by a car going about 50mph. My car did several full spin arounds and when we finally stopped all I remember hearing is my sister crying. I turned around and she looked fine but was crying hard. I asked her if she was alright and through her tears all she said was, "dad is ga-ga-gonna kill you". Thankfully, she was fine.I've been very lucky, I guess. One accident, when I was 16 years old
-That is lucky, but you're probably just a better driver than me.