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.