Memories of family sightings....

[cindybubbles]

Yesterday, on our way back home from church, my father and I reminisced about the time my sister and I rear-ended another car on the highway while we were going to the Ontario Science Centre.

We were inside my uncle's car, a Pontiac, and my sister was the driver. I sat in the front seat, and my dad was in the car behind us (this is important). I forgot who was in the back seat, or if we had any other passengers at all. According to my dad, we were a bunch of teens driving a tank!

Somewhere on the highway, before we encountered a bridge, we neared an open space in the lane next to us, and my sister quickly performed a turn. Suddenly, the car in front of us stopped. I screamed, but it was too late.

BANG!

Did I mention that we were driving a freaking TANK? The poor car in front of us was TOTALED!

We all pulled over and reported to the local Collision Centre. My awesome dad came to the rescue, too. He protected my sister, by saying to the police that it was the other car's fault for stopping! But he knew whose fault it REALLY was, since he told my sister to never turn like that again!

He told me that it was a good thing he was behind us when we collided!

Anyone of you had any memories of self or family road-related sightings?

[drunkenwildmage]

This happened to in my late Wife's family before we had meet.

This happened in '95. They were coming home from a NASCAR race.. Normally the trip was about a 2 and 1/2 hour drive. My wife was riding with her grandmother in a mid 90s Ford ThunderChicken.. Following them was her Grandfather and Uncle who was driving the Grandfather's 84 Ford F250.

Grandma had a tenancy to drive like she was*IN* a NASCAR race and my wife's uncle, not being familiar with the area they were at, was doing all he could to stay up with her.

Now Grandma came upon a stop light fairly quickly and had to slam on the brakes to stop. The truck, being allot bigger and heavier, didn't stop until it got about 2 or 3 feet inside of the trunk of the car. No one got hurt, but it killed the back end of the car, and damaged the radiator of the truck. Of the things in the trunk, it didn't damage my Wife's Wheelchair, but it did split her transfer board, made out of 3/4 inch Oak into 2. Both vehicles were driveable , but for the rest of the trip home, they had to stop every 30 mins or so they could put water back into the radiator of the truck.

About 5 miles from their house, now driving on country back roads, a deer ran out in front of My Wife and her Grandma, and they hit it pretty much dead center on the front car. This pretty much killed the front end of the car, but they manage to limp what was left of it back home.

The next day, Grandma had to call their Insurance Agent, and open up 3 claims. Claim 1 was for the damage on the back of the car. Claim 2 was for the damage from the front of the truck, and claim 3 was for the damage on the front of the car.

[Ophbalance]

Wait... am I correctly reading that your father lied in order to avoid having your sister take responsibility for an accident, making the other driver responsible for being at fault when they were not?

[cindybubbles]

Wait... am I correctly reading that your father lied in order to avoid having your sister take responsibility for an accident, making the other driver responsible for being at fault when they were not?

He said it, not me! She was already in trouble with Dad, so he thought that was enough.

[IT Grunt]

I recall one from a family trip to Myrtle Beach. We used to go every summer in the mid 80's to a campground called Lake Arrowhead. It was a great campground, but it's all condos now unfortunately. Anyways, I was in the car with my grandparents behind my parents and siblings who were pulling an old Bethany camper (early 70's vintage.. steel frame, a recreational tank) with our Mercury Zephyr station wagon. We ran that old wagon pretty hard, I think once the transmission caught fire pulling that thing.

It had been raining, and we were only one light away from getting to the campground, and it turned red. So dad started to slow down, but unfortunately, that heavy camper started to push the car into a hydroplane and he started sliding down the highway, right towards the rear end of a brand new Cadillac(!!!). So... hit an expensive car, or take your chances off road? Off road it was, dad let off the brake and steered off the road and into a small clearing, sideswiping along a line of trees along the edge of it which is all that kept it from tumbling down the hill those trees were at the top of.

Overall, though, the decision ended up with a lot less damage than if he'd hit the Caddy. Scratches on the car, a couple dents, dents and scratches on the camper, but no major damage. It's a story we tell to this day.

[An Haddock]

I remember driving to our family's vacation house in Maryland... I think my mom was on call that weekend so she didn't go. It was me, my dad, and my uncle.

We were about 20 minutes from the place when a deer darted out in front of the car... pretty sure we hit it dead-on going at least 45mph as it was a highway. The deer basically limped its way into the field to the right of us and vanished. They're pretty hearty creatures but I can't imagine how the thing couldn't have had internal injuries.

The car, fortunately, was miraculously unharmed.

[cindybubbles]

And now for some self-sightings...

I developed panic attacks when riding in a car on the day of the TTC wildcat strike. Previously, I took the TTC to work for a very demanding boss (that's another story). She was so demanding that I feared going to work for her.

So, when the wildcat strike happened, I had to rely on my dad to take me to that awful workplace. We went on the highway, me in the front seat, and thought that it was the best choice.

BIG MISTAKE!

I panicked and screamed the whole way. It was worse when he accelerated, though he did his best to calm me down. I even grabbed his arm while we were hurtling down the highway, not a good choice if you want to live, by the way. Good thing he was steady and slowed down until I could calm down!

Later, the same thing happened with my sister (I have only one sibling, so she's the one in the OP), and what's worse, she had her two small children with us in her minivan! Again, I grabbed her arm, but she stopped me, and said that I could have killed us all!

Finally was when I panicked while in the front seat of my mother's car, while we were heading out of the parking lot, going no more than 20 km/h. That's right. TWENTY KILOMETRES per HOUR. So very slow. That's when we realized that my then boss was the problem and I had to quit.

I still have panic attacks to this day, though I'm better off in the back seat, and with my mother driving. It's the backing out and acceleration that makes me panic.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Wait... am I correctly reading that your father lied in order to avoid having your sister take responsibility for an accident, making the other driver responsible for being at fault when they were not?

He said it, not me! She was already in trouble with Dad, so he thought that was enough.

Still not cool. That other driver could still be held financially responsible for damage to your father's car, and get a citation to boot.

Now my story: We were headed home from a family vacation one year when I was a wee Irvling and were on a two-lane road behind somebody just crawling along.

But any time there would be an opening to pass the slower car, it would suddenly speed up and we couldn't pass. Then the driver would go back to crawling along.

Finally we were able to pass that other car. And that was the first time I ever saw somebody flip the bird. My mom did it from the passenger seat.

[MoonCat]

OK, back in the late 90's one of my cousins was getting married up in Ontario. I rode back to the US that night with my uncle and one of my aunts. My uncle was in his early 70's, I think, and had been drinking a bit, plus his eyesight was not great. My aunt and I were a little worried about riding back with him (you have to cross a rather large bridge over the Niagara River...). It's also dark as hell along the highways we were using. He got a little confused and kept taking wrong turns, my aunt and I were getting more and more nervous trying to correct him, and he was going pretty fast. Finally he took a turn down some little side road, barreling along in the pitch dark, and came to a dead stop when a low fence suddenly loomed out of the night in front of us. I think it was some kind of service road, with one little light at the end of it, and beyond it we could just make out the river.

When the yelling stopped, my uncle just said, in the flattest, deadpan voice I've ever heard, "People get excited." Then he backed up to the main road and drove us home with no more problems.

[lordlundar]

My Dad and I were going to do some night security for a local festival's setup period. The security beat itself was pretty dull and uninteresting. One of the trips however...

We were heading to the area, going across an intersection when I saw it, a pickup truck running a red light. It's true, time seems to slow down when your in an accident. When I shook the cobwebs out of my head we were spun around, facing the opposite direction we were going. The pickup truck that hit us was on the opposite end of the intersection from when it entered, front end crushed and leaking a variety of fluids. Oh, and the passenger side headlight? In the back window of the car on the driver side and we were smacked on the passenger side.

Yeah, pretty solid hit. No way the truck was moving after that. Fortunately we were in a Delta '88, a luxury car with a steel shell and frame. I honestly thought we could drive the car after that hit. And for the funny coincidence, on one of the corners was a Herbert's auto body shop.

[HotelMinion]

I've had something like that happen to me. I wasn't turning but the jackass in front of me suddenly stopped on the highway, going 75 to 0 in less than a minute. I had a van and my sis and bro were there and were thrown forward. I think the jackass stopped because he was trying to read a sign because he was just squinting to the side. Ugggggh I could strangle him for scaring half my lifespan off.

My sis was driving and backing out of a gas station, and nearly hit a guy behind her. Didn't notice him but I did, and I thought she saw.

My bro he ran right through a red light, didn't see it at all. Luckily there was no one there to crash into.

Me, well...my worst one was thinking another moving car was stopped and hitting so that his rim fell off. I got a ticket.

[cindybubbles]

Still not cool. That other driver could still be held financially responsible for damage to your father's car, and get a citation to boot.

Except that our car didn't have a scratch on it. Did I mention that we were driving a tank?

I don't know what else happened. I was just a young girl in the front passenger seat at the time of the crash, waiting patiently in the Collision Control Centre for this to be over with so we could go to the Science Centre as planned.

All I know is that I'll probably never drive, because I want to avoid incidents like this.

[Jack7957]

No accident, but still frightening. Years ago, Christmas Eve, driving back from church, my brother and I are following my grandmother who is alone in her car. We're going through our small village, has a total of four stoplights, only three when this happened, and she would only need to go through two of them. We're approaching the first light and it's red, but she just goes and makes her left turn without stopping, no brake lights, nothing. We wait for the green, and as we make our left turn we can see the next light ahead and it's red. She is still in sight, and we see her go right through that one too. Luckily it's Christmas Eve so there wasn't a lot of traffic, if any at all, but no one believed us when we told them what we saw.

[EvilEmpryss]

Self-sighting.

Driving in the hills behind an air base in California -- okay, speeding in the hills behind an air base in California -- a Pinto station wagon loaded full of my school buddies back before seat belts were mandatory (please don't try and count how long ago that was). I was taking the curves like Mario Andretti and the ups and downs like I was driving the General Lee. I was literally catching air going over those rises on the way to a swimming hole one summer. The turn off for the swimming hole was a dirt road at the bottom of a deep dip in the road between two hills. I came over the rise doing at least 80, not realizing I was at my turn. Brilliant invincible teenager hyped on adrenaline that I was, I figured I'd hit the brakes and make the 90* turn from the asphalt to the dirt road.

Only the car's low center of gravity kept us from rolling. That Pinto hit the gravel and did at least three full spins, taking out a road sign and a fence post in its path. We were damned lucky that no one got hurt (or worse) that day. And the only damage was two dents in the rear passenger quarter panel where the posts hit and broke off.

I would take that station wagon ditch jumping at the river bottoms, speeding through Reno traffic, and any other crazy thing I could think of.

Not only did I learn a lot about how to repair oil pans and body panel dents, I gained a rep a school for driving like I had the Force on my side.

[wolfie]

EE, when you say "Pinto wagon", that pretty much pins things down - nobody would have associated "General Lee" with a car, since The Dukes Of Hazzard hadn't been aired yet. BTW, it was the hatchbacks, not the wagons, that you needed to drive fast to be SURE nobody rear-ended you.