somethin's been worryin' me

[itsmecindi]

somethin\'s been worryin\' me

It's even worse now that I work third shift and have been traveling the back roads in the dark on an almost nightly basis.

I was talking to a man night before last. He came into the store at about midnight to buy an aquarium for his sister for Christmas. Said she'd just awakened after an eight month coma. She hit two cows in the road coming home one night and the resultant crash just about killed her. He wanted the biggest auaraium we had. It was a hundred and fifty dollars. He said it was worth every penny as it was what she wanted and he wished we had a bigger one.

There's just no way to really prepare for something like this is there? I think about it all the time. What would I do if I came upon a bunch of cows, or even one in the road. Or a deer, or a wild hog. I use my brights and slow my speed at night, but somehow it doesn't seem like enough preparation.

What would happen if I came up on an eight foot alligator stretched across the road? It would be hard to see and it would have to be the equivalent of hitting a speed wave at fifty five miles an hour. I have visions of becoming airborne. If I tried to stop and hit it at a slower speed, couldn't it possibly flip the vehicle?

I have heard horror stories about hitting a deer and having it come through the windsheild, the driver being impaled with a hoof or an antler. Shudder. Somehow I never hear any stories...oh yeah, hit a cow last night, wrecked my car but I'm okay. Are there any such stories? Or do they all end in tragedy?

 

[Junkman]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

I have taken out 3 deer in my more than 40 years of driving and none of them came through the windshield and only one did major damage to the car. Can't say that I would want to hit a cow, because they are much larger. If it really worries you, have a set of bright driving lights installed that will illuminate the road better for you at night. Some of the newer high candlepower driving lights are as bright as the landing lights on aircraft.......

 

[slowzuki]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

Where I live deer get hit by everyone, most mornings there is a dead deer on the road. Never seems to be anyone killed, just broken windsheilds and smashed bumpers.

Now moose, that is a different story, very few walk away from those collisions. I'm guess a cow would be similar.

Other than knowing the typical places, driving slower at night, having good highbeams and not panicing and steering into the ditch, not much to do about it.

Ken

 

[chim]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

I have never (so far) hit any big animals with a vehicle, but know plenty of people who have. More than a dozen have hit deer. One guy rolled his SUV, but none of the people I know first-hand were seriously injured.

A guy form the next town West of us wasn't so lucky a few years ago. Small car + big deer = deer through windshield + dead driver. Just heard on thr radio yesterday two people were killed on RT 81 or 83 near Harrisburg (PA) and the accident was blamed on deer. Don't know the details, mebbe car crashed when the driver tried to miss the deer.

One of my friends in HS hit a cow with his 1960 Bonneville back in ~1966. Bent the front end even on the heavy car. Joe was fine, but I think the cow had to be put down.

Don't worry about cows and deer. Drive carefully, but there are a lot of other things out there that will GETCHA! before the "Revenge of the Bovines". Heck, I just read there are somewhere between 150,000 and 250,000 people prematurely shuffling off to Heaven because of mistakes made by doctors and hospitals..................chim

 

[heehaw]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

something my dad always told me..you can "what if" yourself right into the nut house....if this happens or if that happens..he would then tell me, if a frog had wings, he wouldn't bump his bottom when he hopped; or if a toad frog had a hip pocket, he'd carry a 45.....i never did figure out what that meant???
i don't know how big a vehicle you drive, but the bigger the better, if these things are worrying you....you might find one big enough to make that gator into a slight bump...
but then, what about lightning storms??? tornados?? ya just can't prepare for it all..
heehaw

 

[Golfgar4]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

When I was in the Navy, we became close friends with a fellow and his wife from Nebraska. After we all got out and moved back to our respective areas of the country, we coordinated a long weekend together at his place. So we drove out to Nebraska. After we got there, my friend, who operated a feed mill and a hog farm, needed to make a feed delivery to a customer and he invited me to come along. Later I figured out that he just wanted my extra hands! /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif Anyway, we go out to get his pickup truck and it has the largest and most heavily constructed grill guard I've ever seen! /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif I asked him why he had such a contraption hanging from the front of his truck. He said because out on the plains where they lived, you never knew what might come flying out of a corn field in front of you. He went on to say that on average, he probably hit 3 - 5 animals a year ( deer, hogs, cattle, etc.). He said that with the grill guard, his truck barely even shuddered when he hit something.

After driving around his town with him for a few hours, and seeing all of the other trucks with similar grill guards on the front, I realized that hitting animals in that area was truly a serious problem.

I don't know what kind of vehicle you drive Cindi, but I know you've mentioned a pickup in the past. Maybe you want to consider having this kind of grill guard mounted. Even if you never need it, it would certainly provide you the piece of mind that if you ever do hit an animal, it may not cause you or your passengers any injuries.

 

[kensfarm]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

I agree.. I read this "quote" on another site.. the woman said her mother would always tell her this.. "Life is happening while you are planning for something else!" and another quote from a 90 year old man.. "Why worry.. God won't let you die.. until it's your time to go!"

If you can't drive a bigger vehicle.. wasn't there a discussion about those deer siren/repellars? (not sure of the name) that attach to the bumper of your car/truck?

Don't worry.. be Happy! /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif

 

[OkeeDon]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

In 31 years of living in South Florida, I don't recall any stories about anyone hitting an alligator and causing damage to themselves. I have seen them on the road; asphalt retains heat better than the ground, and being cold blooded, they like to lay on a road on cold evenings (cold being relative around here). I've usually seen them on the edge, however, never in the middle, and in 31 years, I've only seen a few. They're pretty skittish; you'd have to be the first car through since they arrived, because the first one will scare them away from the road. I wouldn't be overly concerned. Besides, you're much more likely to run over a tread thrown from a truck tire (truck drivers call them "alligators").

Your car or truck is much tougher than you think; it can usually handle such a "speed bump" and not flip, although you might bite your tongue or jar your teeth. There's always a freak chance, but like the others said, you'll go nuts worrying about every possibility.

As for deer, I try to keep an eye on the shoulder of the road. From my observation, they like to wait back at the far edge of the shoulder until they see the beam of light, then jump right into it. Hard to avoid if you're not looking for them, but pretty easy to avoid if you keep an eye out. If you see a deer on the shoulder, always assume it's going to jump in front of you.

Cows are pretty hard to miss seeing them if you have your brights on, and I don't think they leap out as fast as a deer. When I see them on the side of the road, they usually go on eating grass and ignore me.

What I worry most about is a human being on the side of the road in dark clothing. When winter comes, we get a lot of transients (used to be called "bums") in Florida, and some of them are not too stable as they walk along. Hit one of them and you have real trouble.

 

[AndyM]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

There was a woman out here a couple months back that hit a deer on the highway and it flipped up and went through her windshield and killed her.

Of course this is the extreme. Most of them aren't as bad...

I've hit two deer with my Ranger so far this year. The first one just scrapped up the bumper. The most recent one a couple weeks ago pushed my bumper back and shattered my grill. Nothing a little duct tape can't fix... /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

My boss was out hunting all last week and came back with nothing, and the running joke at work is that I've killed more deer this year than he has! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[ScottAR]

Re: somethin\'s been worryin\' me

I hit a deer last weekend. Broke a marker light, Deer ran away...

"Worrying is like rockin' in a chair, It's somthing to do, but ya don't get anywhere"