Close shaves....

[jonno_c]

How close is close?! Not really fully connected with the car as its not my daily driver (girlfriend doesnt know how lucky she is!) but had it slide out a bit towards the curb on a roundabout a while back which made me think, whoah - hang on Jon!
Anyone else had some bum clenchers?? ; )

 

[AdDaMan]

that doesn't sound like much of a close shave!
Ive had some really close shaves but none i care to divulge lol

 

[jonno_c]

I know, more of a whoah, easy now! Just sat here bored so thought I would start a thread! ; )

 

[Knuckles]

That's terrible.

when I was 17, I watched in my rear view mirror as I was sliding backwards, down a hill, in the snow, towards a parked Megane. Stopped 2" from it. Genuinely s**t bricks.


fyi, I entered the hill facing forwards. That was the day I learned handbrakes are bad m'kay

 

[McGherkin]

Entering a roundabout at 60 mph comes to mind.

And the back end stepping out at 110kph too.

 

[jonno_c]

2" from it! Someone had your back that day! !

 

[Ashh]

First ever drive in torrential rain coming back from Cramlington on the A19, hit a patch of standing water and aquaplaned heading directly towards a ditch.

Had only bought the car 1 week before, and it was my first ever time on my own.

Poo definitely came out!

 

[Owen92]

Losing the rear end on my 106 on a roundabout in the wet and spinning blocking the entrance to the roundabout from a blind corner as a artic came round the corner.

Another time was coming round a blind bend on a country road to be confronted with a tractor moving some farming equipment that was seriously over hanging my lane. Missed it by what couldn't be any more than a couple of centimetres.

 

[ed55j]

This is going to be a long thread

 

[Knuckles]

2" from it! Someone had your back that day! !

Yup. I though I'd drive back to college sensibly after that, driving up a long hill, I turned the wheel a tiny bit to get back into lane and the whole car skidded 90 degrees. I was not pleased lol. I just sat there in a huff with the car.

 

[jonno_c]

This is going to be a long thread

Haha! I think you are right Sir......

 

[at3k-]

Locked up in the rain traveling towards a junction and I just stopped in time. Heart in throat to say the least, would of been T boned otherwise.

 

[LiamR172]

Spun in the middle of a dualler because i was being an idiot. Lucky it was late at night and there were no other cars at the time.

How the car stayed on the road i dont know, must have done a 360 anyway, one of those slow motion moments!

 

[Ph1 Tom]

In my 1st car (1.6 Escort) I came around a long sweeping bend at some speed. As I came around there was a Honda CRV in front doing half the speed limit, jabbed the brakes and the back end came right round.

I ended up going completely sideways down the road with 1/2 the car going with traffic and the other 1/2 on the wrong side of the road. Steered into it to straighten up and carried on ok but I'm very thankful nothing was coming the other way otherwise that would have been the end.

 

[Knuckles]

I've had the back end on my car step out into oncoming traffic a couple of times...

Once due to rain, fixed with power. Don't lift off when understeering

once due to grit on the road, fixed with power, don't decide to turn a 90 degree bend last minute

once I was side ways, mid air, coming onto an oddly cambered roundabout... Fixed that with good tyres lol. And power. Don't try to outrun the slow car to your left and the slow car coming around the roundabout.

 

[Stephenx77]

In my old mk4 fiesta I had to brake going round a roundabout quite quickly due to a queue of traffic I couldn't see from the other side. The back end stepped out and I managed to hold it whilst coming to a stop inches away from the queuing car's rear bumper. Proud moment, but I'd be quite happy if it didn't happen again!

 

[cat171]

I've had the back end out three times on the Vee.

 

[McGherkin]

Does sliding into the middle of a busy road at 5 mph on ice count?

 

[Craigie-B]

Ive had a fair few, a few of them would of killed me if I had actually crashed as well lol.

 

[McGherkin]

Few close shaves in This thread

 

[aucky]

Pulling my light stalk to turn full beams off before a left turn on a country lane, my fingers caught the bump on the stalk and turned my lights off completely, sending me into a 60mph bend in pitch black. CLENCH!

 

[jonno_c]

I can remember coming to a t junction off a b Road, with a lot of gravel, too fast and nearly T-Boning a Porsche that was doing about 50mph! (Was in my old Mondeo estste) ; (

 

[AdDaMan]

Entering a roundabout at 60 mph comes to mind.

And the back end stepping out at 110kph too.

60?! You can attack roundabouts at about 70 in a clio sport!
I remember approaching a roundabout at 140 and stamping on the brakes with very little happening. One of the most frightening moments of my life lol.
Coilovers saved us that day

 

[McGherkin]

It wasn't a roundabout which you'd normally be able to do 60 round.

And WTF would you approach a roundabout at 140 for?!?

 

[The Boosh!]

I had to stop the car and have a word with myself once or twice but I never had any close shaves as such.

 

[.Steve]

Spinning out on a roundabout after hitting oil, ended up sliding backwards and almost in to another car.

Bounced my car up a kerb in the snow and almost through someone's wall.

Driving along the a69 for about 60 miles, with Linglong tyres and tracking issues (toe)... Every time I hit standing water I ended up in a different lane, worst drive yet.

 

[Eddie.]

My driving is flawless in every way.

 

[JaredHasNoBrain]

Had one big scare, going around a 90 degree corner and the back end kicked out, swerved to the other side of the road, got it back onto the correct side of the road, then headed to a kerb so brakes and hand brake was pulled, back end went nuts and kicked out again then headed straight for a bus stop kerb (like the really high ones)

Hand brake yank again from probably 2-3" from the actual kerb then got it back undercontrol.

At that moment it was happening I s**t my pants, then as soon as I knew I was safe I was soooo pumped lol

 

[Advikaz]

I've had a few,

one memorable moment though was when I was chasing a mate down some country lanes near his (one way), he scandy flicked it through a corner, momentarily ran out of talent, sent it across someone's front lawn (big country home) sideways sending a lawns worth of turf on to my windscreen & re joined the road further up narrowly missing my front end, still absolutely fully it.

No biggy.

 

[Dave..]

Many many incidents. I once got very sideways round a left hander, avoided the two cars on the other side of the road but dinked the grass verge and the tyre blew out.

4 wheel drifts are fun in the snow, but don't do them out of works car park unless you want to hit the curb.

Had both the Clio and the Audi break away down steep hills in the snow. Squeaky bum time, hoping you don't hit anything while you manically pump the brakes.

Once was under the illusion that Colin McRae had been reincarnated as a younger me, and decided to apply handbrake round a snowy corner. Cue panic, letting go of handbrake, leaving it stuck on, a bruised ego and a broken splitter.

 

[Cub.]

Only a week or so ago I was hammering enthusiastically around a roundabout to have a middle aged guy pull out onto roundabout right in front of me. Stamped on the brakes and lost the back because it's got 50/50 braking at the mo. Somehow avoided everything, but it shook me right up.

At first I was angry with the guy who pulled out, but looking back - it's my own fault for going round it at 'track speed' and for driving it without sorting the ABS problem out. Poor guy probably wasn't even aware cars could go around roundabouts that fast, let alone a clio.

Lesson learnt, stop acting the hero, book another track day and fix ABS

 

[ed55j]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmhb4kHfAgc

This.

 

[Cudey]

Close shaves? This was actually a minor accident, but potentially could have been a hell of a lot worse, so will class it as a close shave.

10 days after passing my test at 18, I was driving a Ford Fiesta 1.2 SI and was driving through a private estate. I went to go round the corner at 30mph when all of a sudden the back end skidded out and I panicked (as most new drivers would). I was skidding towards a group of school kids, but luckily managed to take the car away from them and skidded the other way towards an oncoming car. I panicked more and thought about my insurance costs and somehow managed to skid it back towards the pavement to miss it. I missed the brake and hit the accelerator instead and was going about 40mph now with the car totally out of control - There was no way I could get the car under control now or change the direction, and all I could see directly in front of me was a little old lady walking a dog on the pavement. It seemed like my whole life had frozen in front of me at this stage, but my first reaction was to pull up the handbrake and try my hardest to go further left to miss her. This was very quick thinking as if I tried going past her the back end would have probably taken both of them out. The end result was I missed her and the dog by literally an inch or 2 and had crashed head on into a metal fence by a rail line. I sat there with my head on the steering in total shock and really thought i'd hit her or the dog at the least. My window was down and all I could hear was this little voice saying "Sir, are you okay?" to which I responded "Is the dog alive?". Luckily both were fine, I hadn't hit a school kid, and I missed the on coming car.

Once I got out the car an ambulance was on the scene and a cocky tw*t of a copper, I realized how lucky I really was, either side of my car was a lampost and telegraph pole. To this day I have no idea how it wasn't worse.

The car apparently lifted off the ground when hitting the curb, and was a total write off (despite the old lady saying the car only had a little scratch) and I had walked away with a few bruises and no major injuries, though some idiot tried charging me for the grass that was damaged.

 

[J.C.]

In my first year of driving I went round a sharp bend on a country lane on a wet road, I usually go round at 30 max but I was doing 40 this time. I thought this is too fast and foolishly took my foot off... oops. Kept correcting to the left but ended up driving straight into an open field. Nothing wrong with the car as i'd slowed down a lot and it was essentially like driving down a bumpy track, just drove the car to the bottom of the field and out of the gate. Lucky there was no one coming, and that I didn't hit anything, even went through the gap in the hedge surrounding the field.

As Clarkson would say 'a bit of poo came out there'.

 

[Toby]

5 up in my 106 going 55 round a sharp right hander into a tunnel in the pouring rain aged 17...

Lost the back end and stopped 5 foot short of the brick side wall of the tunnel.

 

[Bobby.]

My driving is flawless in every way.

LOL!

 

[Harbinger]

Just before I turned 19 i invested in a 94 Rover 220 Turbo Coupe, I felt like a god on the road in that thing, it's actually a beast of a car by modern standards, anyway not being experienced and my car before that was a 91 Astra 1.4 merit I had no experience in fast cars let alone turbo'd motors, Driving home with the Ex b**ch in the car, decided to give it some beans down the Dual Carriage way at Thorpe Park, going at over 100MPH got the roundabout at the bottom by CarCraft foot on the brake and the whole thing went sideways and ended the wrong way round on a round about, was 5PM too and very busy, luckily I slotted between the traffic and didn't hit anyone or anything.

Was one of the moments where you get the copper taste in your mouth and freeze whilst thinking f**k really load in your head but then afterwards think that was awesome!

 

[Scrooge]

Blowout at tripple figures and few normal incidents when I was 17.

 

[sparklesTHEpony]

Nearly written mine off completely.

Me driving and my friend sat navving our way through an area both of us have never been to before so we dont know any roads, this is around 2pm, ended up on a typical country lane, 2 lanes, very narrow, hedges overgrowing on both sides making it even more narrow.

Going around 30-35mph at this point, no other cars around just us, see a bend approaching, according to the sat nav it was a half circle bend kinda like ) that haha, slowed down to around 25, start to go round it, realise im going way too fast, start to brake, still going too fast and im forced to go on the other side of the road to get round this thing, turns out the bend wasnt a ) shape.. it was a V shape, VERY sharp turn, by the time i had to go onto the otherside of the road we both were in a butt clenching moment, as soon as we got round it to see the other stretch of road (still going too fast even though im just doing nothing but braking) there was only a Dustbin lorry man on his daily dutys, im on the opposite side of the road, he emergency stops chronic, im still going too fast, i brake hard and manage to understeer/drift my way onto my side of the road with my back end out literally missing him by CMs. Had to pull over to s**t, piss and cry. Turns out the name of that lane was called .. wait for it.. "Dead Lane".

Dosent sound that frightening due to the speed i was going at, but this bend was a turn so sharp, if you knew it youd have to pretty much go around 5mph to go around it. Hitting that at almost 30 with a dustin lorry about to come round on the otherside would make you cry.

This is my country road driving lesson thoroughly learnt.

 

[jonno_c]

Country roads are a nightmare. Friend of a friend ended up killing a horse on one once...... ; (