The Day I Almost Killed At Least Three People
Many years ago, in a former life when I was married to my first wife, we shared a hobby that is formally known as arctophilia. (If that sounds like something that should be illegal, don’t worry – it’s just a fancy name for a love of teddy bears.)
It started innocently enough, as many hobbies do, but it got out of hand, as you can read about here.
The Incident
One day, we were going to go to a teddy bear convention in Stratford-upon-Avon (yes, the town where Shakespeare made his name), and we were taking a friend with us.
That was about an hour’s drive from home, and when the day came, it was tipping down – the rain was bouncing off the roads.
Unusually for me (because I have always preferred to be early), we were running a bit late, and I was driving a bit faster than I should have been – but not excessively so, or so I thought.
Yes, back in those days, I frequently broke the speed limit, and while I, like most drivers, liked to think I was a better-than-average driver, I know now, with hindsight, that I had several faults, and speeding was one of them, because most of us like to think our reaction times are fast enough to deal with the unexpected.
We had reached a part of the journey where there were plenty of long, sweeping bends, and it was still raining hard.
It was maybe half way to Stratford, and we approached one such bend in the road, that ended up being about ninety degrees, in a gradual sort of way.
It’s worth noting that this road was one I was very familiar with because I made this journey at least once a month – the teddy bear club we used to go to also met near Stratford.
Anyway, I was probably doing about sixty miles per hour.
That speed was legal on that road, but it was probably not safe given the conditions.
Again, hindsight.
I’d barely entered the curve in the road when all of a sudden, and I know words like “suddenly” are often overused, but in this case, it was literally true, the car lost all traction (yes, my tires were in good condition with plenty of tread) and started drifting across the other side of the road. (Remember, in the United Kingdom, they drive on the left.)
Everything happened so quickly, it was truly scary.
A second later, at most, the car regained traction – I assume the road was at an angle, with the right side of the road being higher up than the left side, and there must have been less water on that side of the road.
The tires gripped the still wet tarmac, and I was able to quickly and safely steer back to my own side of the road.
Like I said, the entire incident was over within a second or two, but the aftermath of what had happened stayed with me for a long time – because this happened over 16 years ago now.
Firstly, I realized I had been aquaplaning – something I’d read about but never experienced before. (If I had, I probably would have been driving slower in the first place.)
And then the possible consequences of my driving too fast for the wet roads hit home:
- If the other side of the road hadn’t been less wet, we would likely have slid off the road completely and ended up in a ditch.
- If any other vehicles had been coming the other way, we could easily have had a head-on collision, with who knows what results.
And although I didn’t have time to apply the brakes, because of the speed with which the incident happened, I now know that even if I’d tried them, they wouldn’t have done anything because that’s part of the problem of aquaplaning – your tires are not actually in contact with the road.
My two passengers – my wife and my friend – were surprisingly silent.
There were no screams, no gasps, and not even any recriminations after the event.
Nobody, including me, said a word about what had happened – not then, not during the rest of our day out, and not later on either.
The good news is that the rest of the day passed without incident, and we all had a good time – and we made it home again that evening with no more near-accidents..
Lessons
Whenever I write about these anecdotal stories, I try to include lessons that I learned and that, hopefully, other people can apply.
So, what did I learn?
Well, first and foremost, I learned not to drive so fast on wet roads – because you really cannot tell how much water is lying on the surface.
And even if you did know how much water there was, would you be able to calculate what is the maximum safe speed given that quantity of water?
No, I don’t think so.
The answer, then, that I came up with was to drive slower than you think you should – i.e. err on the side of caution.
And that’s probably a good life lesson in many situations, especially where there is a real possibility of dangerous or life-threatening consequences.
Yes, I get that some people are thrill-seekers (aka adrenaline junkies), and that’s fine – but it’s not for me, and never consciously has been.
This is, of course, even more important when other people’s lives are at stake too – as they always are when you’re driving a car.
Even if you have no passengers, there are other road users to consider, as well as pedestrians and animals.
The irony was that in most situations, that was exactly the approach I would naturally take – but again, because many of us like to think we are better drivers than we probably are, I was less careful than I should have been.
Taking a broader perspective, what it showed me was that your life can change in an instant – and you may have no control. (The sudden and unexpected loss of my second wife is another example of this, something I’ve written about in other articles.)
I could have driven slower, of course, but once the aquaplaning started, I was simply an observer.
You clearly cannot lead your life permanently worried that something unexpected and potentially fatal will happen – you’d be immobilized, as I’m sure some people effectively are, but these people seem to me like they are existing rather than truly living.
But being more aware of your surroundings and having an eye for possible risks is definitely a skill worth developing, as is knowing the basics of what to do in an emergency (e.g. controlling a skid).
Returning to driving, one of the things that drives me crazy when watching TV shows and movies is when you see the person driving the vehicle turn to talk to their passenger for what seems like way too long.
For example, if you’re driving at 50 miles per hour, then if you take your eyes off the road for as few as five seconds, you’ve just travelled 120 yards – which is one sixteenth of a mile. (For those of you who work in metric, then at 80 kilometres per hour, you travel 110 metres in five seconds, which works out to be just over one tenth of a kilometre.)
And a lot can happen in 120 yards – especially when you consider another vehicle travelling in the opposite distance may also be going at 50 mph and covering 120 yards themselves.
My late wife, Rae, is the only person I have ever seen who never took her eyes off the road ahead.
And I know that takes a lot of effort, because it’s human nature to want to look at the person you’re talking to, or at a person who is talking to you.
Conclusion
Yes, I know that what I did that day was irresponsible and dangerous, not only for myself but for my two passengers and potentially other people or animals too, and that’s why it was such a valuable lesson for me.
And although I intrinsically knew it, even before this incident, a car is a lethal weapon when used without due care and attention (and skill), and it should always be treated as such.
This is why you cannot approach life, no matter how old you are, from the view that there is nothing left to learn – unfortunately, sometimes we need those hard lessons to remind us of this fact.
