Oakie
1st August 2006, 18:31
Typical huh? No near misses for months and then I get two in 5 seconds.
On my way to work and I approached the big roundabout at the intersection of Burwood Rd and QEII Drive (heading toward town on Burwood). A car entered from the opposite side indicating left and as nothing was coming from the right I started to roll on through ... keeping one eye on that car ... as you do. Thought it funny that the line he was taking wasn't the normal one for going straight through and sure enough just kept on coming around into my line. If I hadn't reacted he probably would still have missed me by a couple of metres but I gave the throttle a squirt and made it quite a comfortable gap. I then lined up my exit behind a van and noticed that the 4WD approaching from my left had started to roll through the start of the intersection although it all looked liked we'd merge nicely ... until the van in front jammed on his brakes. WTF! Surprised I didn't get whiplash with my head flicking to the left, to the front and back again several times to keep an eye on both vehicles as I jumped on the anchors to stop short of the van but not so short that the 4WD would t-bone me. Accomplished that. Turned out that a school kid had tried to run across the road making the van scream to a halt.
I suppose the moral of the story is that your 'incidents' aren't rationed out evenly. Just because you've had one close call doesn't mean the next ones not just around the corner ... so never relax your guard.
On my way to work and I approached the big roundabout at the intersection of Burwood Rd and QEII Drive (heading toward town on Burwood). A car entered from the opposite side indicating left and as nothing was coming from the right I started to roll on through ... keeping one eye on that car ... as you do. Thought it funny that the line he was taking wasn't the normal one for going straight through and sure enough just kept on coming around into my line. If I hadn't reacted he probably would still have missed me by a couple of metres but I gave the throttle a squirt and made it quite a comfortable gap. I then lined up my exit behind a van and noticed that the 4WD approaching from my left had started to roll through the start of the intersection although it all looked liked we'd merge nicely ... until the van in front jammed on his brakes. WTF! Surprised I didn't get whiplash with my head flicking to the left, to the front and back again several times to keep an eye on both vehicles as I jumped on the anchors to stop short of the van but not so short that the 4WD would t-bone me. Accomplished that. Turned out that a school kid had tried to run across the road making the van scream to a halt.
I suppose the moral of the story is that your 'incidents' aren't rationed out evenly. Just because you've had one close call doesn't mean the next ones not just around the corner ... so never relax your guard.