Road Hazard

I hit a large cardboard box diong 70 mph on the freeway once -- must have been mostly empty because it exploded into tiny pieces and there was only minor scuffs on the bumper.

Then there's this:  https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/11692970/Flying-5ft-circular-saw-tears-through-Chinese-mans-car-on-motorway.html

GameboyRMH said:

Worst things I've run over are a coconut and an almost-coconut-sized rock, both in the AE92.

(Note for anyone who thinks a coconut is a brown round fuzzy thing a little bigger than a baseball: That's just the core of a coconut which contains all the goodies. A full coconut is more like an acorn scaled up to be 7~11" around).

The coconut bounced off the underside of the Corolla like a giant wooden ping-pong ball but luckily didn't damage anything. Luckily the car was at full factory ride height back then. When I ran over the rock the car was lowered and had a subframe brace on, which was tweaked a little further.

I've run *into* some worse things in the Samurai that caused more damage, like a truck bogie hidden in a bush, a concrete block the size of a large microwave hidden on the edge of a jungle trail, and an inattentive woman's CRV in a blind intersection, but that's not running *over* something.

I have run over a coconut while driving a Renault 5. The car basically dribbled it for a while. 

wet leaves are suprisingly slippery.....

Gearheadotaku said:

wet leaves are suprisingly slippery.....

Resulted in a hard fall when riding my bicycle once.

I keep hitting these things...

I drove past a black taurus wagon on a two-lane road in the middle of nowhere in the opposite direction that had run head-on into a large black cow in the dark of night in their lane of traffic. EMS was on the scene so it was lit but I could not really imagine having time to brake or swerve to miss the cow in that scenario. 

I hit a 8-10 ft long 6x6 lumber post that fell off a truck on I-95. It was sitting crosswise across the middle lane, but I didn't see it until the SUV ahead of me swerved to avoid it. At 80mph with cars directly to both sides of me, I had no option but to hit it with the right side wheels (this was in my Maxima, by the way). When I hit, it bent the front strut and caused a massive toe/camber change that almost flung me into the car to my right except for quick counter-steer by me.

Pulled over and was amazed that it DIDN'T flat my tire or bend my wheel - just the strut. 

I was a kid and my mother was driving when a tractor trailer spare tire bounced loose ahead of us.  It was bouncing through traffic and hit maybe 40 feet in front of us but was sailing upward as we drove under.  1/2 second farther along and it would have crushed us in our Datsun 310.

Many years ago I saw a K5 blazer lose the drivers side rear super swamper and in front of me and saw it bouncing 20 feet in the air down the freeway at 60 mph, kinda scary.  Also, a little more recently, a semi truck driver passed out on a curved section of the freeway, blew threw the guard rail and ended up on top of an e46 bmw that had been coming the other way, then burned to the ground.  That was definitely a mess.

Will said:

I hit a berkeleying Christmas tree on the 101 freeway.

Huh. I didn’t know Christmas trees did that. 

In reply to jharry3 :

I’m a little curious...

Did you report it to Public Works or call 911, or just post it on the Internet?

My worse on was in a fox body Mustang 4 banger. I was passing a car on the interstate on a dark winters morning when I shaw a shadow in the middle of my lane. I realized too late that is was dead deer that was too high to straddle. There was a car behind me so the only thing I could do was aim my passenger wheel at it. It turned out to be frozen and the car jumped it. I just kept going as there were no cell phones back then. The 55MPH speed limit probably helped too.

SVreX said:

Will said:

I hit a berkeleying Christmas tree on the 101 freeway.

Huh. I didn’t know Christmas trees did that. 

It's how you get little Christmas trees. You can catch them at it if you listen for the jingling bells. That's what the song is really about.

Saw the aftermath of a Suburban vs horse out on the four lane commuting to midnight shift. Scene was tarped. Most blood I ever seen, WTF.

Rodeo and fireworks night at the county fair. Show was running late, fireworks started right after the rodeo but before the horses were trailered or stabled. Fireworks spooked the horse and it ran a 1/4 mile before crossing the four lane.

Next morning it looked like a 55 gal barrel of blood was dumped on the roadway.

Only in my county. 

Worst thing I ever hit was a giant bolt, the head was probably 1.5" and it was about 3" long. It stuck in my tire, but somehow didn't destroy my wheel.

I have a relative in Jamaica who hit a large cow on the road, car was obliterated, he said he had to lean way over to the side in the cabin to avoid taking a cow to the face...

Freshly cut grass blown out onto blacktop is also very slick.