Standing in the waves off Kovalam Beach in India years ago, I was bowled over by a massive wave. I could feel a rip so I stayed under and pushed my hands into the sand on the bottom. I could literally feel the water and sand being sucked out round my forearms so I kept working my hands deeper into the sand to keep them anchored while my body was pulled back straight behind me. Probably only lasted about a minute, but the weird thing was I felt no emotion at all. Just watched it all happen with a detached sense that I was probably doing the right thing. Wasn't massively out of breath at the end.
i was pulled over in virginia by what i perceived as a traffic cop but who, in reality, was a narcotics officer
i hopped out of the truck oblivious to the danger
when i looked up he had his service weapon aimed squarely between my eyes,
and i could see clearly down the barrel to the ominous head of the 9mm hollow point that had my initials inscribed
he made a decision to restrain himself from squeezing the trigger and i am alive to tell you this story
@kevin-eleven saidYour choice, but if I felt like that I wouldn't tell it in a forum.
Glad you are both still here!
I had a close call once (not counting the ones I never knew about), but I don't really want to tell the story.
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@Relentless-Red
In addition to not telling the story, I have also suppressed a whim to edit my post. 😉
@kevin-eleven saidFor sure if it is something you'd sooner not say this isn't the place to say it or it will be thrown back at you 15 years from now! 🙂 You can always tell people you trust by a P.M., although this may be a good time for my story where an unknown entity is involved.
Glad you are both still here!
I had a close call once (not counting the ones I never knew about), but I don't really want to tell the story.
-VR
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In the winter of 1970, my 1st winter in Toronto, a friend and I decided to head to Quebec for some real skiing. We drove there in his MGB GT. Driving down the 401, a “bit” over the speed limit, we passed a car and his driver’s side front tire hit the edge of the road and he overcorrected and the car’s front end hit the snow bank in the medium an it rolled 7 times. When it came to a stop it was on it’s side. The roof caved in and the we managed to crawl out the driver’s side window. I had a cut on my head and a sore knee. He had a broken wrist. The car was a write off, the skis were wrecked but somehow we, miraculously survived. To this day I have no idea how, nor did the folks who saw the whole thing, they were in the car that we were passing and stopped to lend a hand.
@very-rusty this may be a good time for my story where an unknown entity is involved.Then the murders began
-VR
@great-big-stees saidWow, I'm thinking pre-roll bars and in this country that was pre-seat belts possibly??
In the winter of 1970, my 1st winter in Toronto, a friend and I decided to head to Quebec for some real skiing. We drove there in his MGB GT. Driving down the 401, a “bit” over the speed limit, we passed a car and his driver’s side front tire hit the edge of the road and he overcorrected and the car’s front end hit the snow bank in the medium an it rolled 7 times. Whe ...[text shortened]... folks who saw the whole thing, they were in the car that we were passing and stopped to lend a hand.
@Relentless-Red
Yes it was.
All provinces in Canada have primary enforcement seat belt laws, which allow a police officer to stop and ticket a driver if s/he observes a violation. Ontario was the first province to pass a law which required vehicle occupants to wear seat belts, a law that came into effect on January 1, 1976.
-VR
The last time I drank and drove - 25 May 2010 - was my most notable 'I nearly died' incident. Swerving to avoid a man sitting on his stationary lights-off motorcycle in the middle of a dark stretch of road, where he was almost certainly doing a drug deal, and having winged him slightly, I collided with a skip on the verge as I parted ways with my own motorcycle.
@relentless-red saidTalking of pre-seat belts ..
Wow, I'm thinking pre-roll bars and in this country that was pre-seat belts possibly??
Before they were compulsary, I was in a Mini with my mum and brother - mum driving, brother in the front seat, me asleep in the back. We were driving from London up to Newcastle for some family gathering (can't remember the details, I was probably 11 or 12).
Long corner on the A1 was covered in black ice and we went straight into the kerb instead of going round the corner. I remember waking up with a lot of greenery going past the windows and the weird sensation of seeing things floating upwards from the floor of the car.
I thought we were going through a hedge, turns out we had hit the kerb hard enough to flip the car end-over-end a couple of times and then slide along on the roof before ending up sideways in a ditch.
About fifteen minutes previously my brother had said to my mum - "We should probably buckle up" . So they had seat-belts on and I was fast asleep, lying down on the back seat when it happened. No one hurt.
The Mini was fantastic - there was a tiny dent in the roof and the wing mirrors were gone, other-wise you couldn't really see that it had been in an accident (apart from the snapped front axle I suppose - left wheel at 90 degrees to the right).
Aged 11, non-swimmer, playing in chest-deep river water and showing off, stepped off the sandbar into much deeper water and immediately submerged. Bobbed to the surface, nobody saw, submerged again. Had time to think of the definition of drowning: go down 3 times and come up twice. Bobbed up for the third time. The next bit is wiped from my memory, but I came round on the riverbank being very ill indeed. No fear at the time, that was surprising since until then I was afraid of dying.
There’s a sweeping 90 degree right-hand bend on the A303 heading eastbound just before Marsh in the Blackdown Hills of Devon.
It was summer 1980 and I was on my Suzuki GSX250 hammering 90mph down the long approach breaking to about 75. I dropped two gears and I felt confident as I leant it right over keeping the throttle open a little knowing the Avon Roadrunners were excellent tires.
As I approached the exit of the bend I snapped the throttle open and the power revved around the dial. Instantly (unbeknown to myself) the drive sprocket locking nut snapped and the chain locked between the drive sprocket and the gearbox housing causing it to also jump off of the rear sprocket also. The engined screamed and I lamely freewheeled to a nearby house where a kind man helped me fix the front sprocket by torque wrenching an imperial nut onto the metric drive shaft.
Why was it near death? Well later that month I was reading Bike magazine and one of the journalists has the same experience at 30 mph except in his case the chain locked between the rear sprocket such that the rear wheel locked up and he came off. Apparently it was a design fault in the model. If that had happened to me I would have gone into the chevron bend warning boards or worse the telegraph pole. I would have been lucky to survive.
I’ve driven that road dozens of times since and even in a car I always slow down to look at the telegraph pole.