Shane Roach
Stunt Coordinator
- Joined
- Nov 19, 2003
- Messages
- 77
Fortunately, I've never been in any crashes that resulted in serious bodily or vehicular injury.
There have only been two actual collisions, almost exactly a year apart. The first was during my senior year of high school. I was the last in a bumper-to-bumper line of about six cars following the class float to the staging area for the homecoming parade, traveling around 4.6 mph, when an elderly chap pulled out of a diner and drove smack into my driver-side door. I had to crawl out the other side, which in a Datsun 260Z isn't as easy as it sounds. She needed a new door and some paint work, but that was it.
The next year, also during homecoming week, I picked my little sister up from school one afternoon. While stopped waiting for traffic to clear so I could make a left turn, a guy who had graduated with me and had just picked his brother up overestimated his ability to stop on the wet pavement and rear-ended us. That crash required some minor body and frame work and a new gas tank.
I've had a few harmless solo spins and several near-misses dodging folks who tried to pull out into my path, but there was one about 18 months ago that really rattled me. One day on my way to work I almost got run over by an 18-wheeler. I was in the left lane at about 45 mph and accelerating, rolling beside a 50-ish blonde lady in a Chrysler 300M, burgundy with beige leather. I remember that distinctly. A tractor trailer was in the median/turning lane, with his left turn signal on. As I got about 50-60 feet from the tail of the trailer, he decided to start rolling and move into my lane. By the time I got my foot on the center pedal and hard on the brakes, I was about even with the rear wheels, and he was still moving over. I pushed harder and locked up both front brakes. The stripes on the pavement lasted for months, and all I saw in the mirror 1.8 seconds later was smoke. I had already started turning the wheel slightly to the right so I could slip in behind the Chrysler, but with both fronts locked I was just going straight ahead. I eased off the brakes just a bit as she went past, and shot to the right when the wheels started rolling again. A little bit of luck, a little bit of skill, and a little bit of divine assistance meant I only had a couple of flat-spotted tires when the situation could have been a whole lot worse.
That was one of those situations where you become aware of just how quickly your brain can process information. I knew the truck was coming over, there was nothing I could do to stop that, and no way I could come to a stop before running into/under the trailer. The only way out was to match his angle and pray that the lady in the Chrysler didn't punch her brakes, too. At some point I checked my mirror to make sure there was nobody behind me in either lane (there wasn't), and subconsciously dropped from 5th to 3rd gear as I changed lanes. I NEVER remember to downshift in panic situations. Then came the flood of reactions: anger, confusion, "what the fuck?!," disbelief, awareness that I had not in fact crapped my pants, relief, "thank you Jesus," and thankfulness that not only had I lived through a potentially fatal episode but I also had a brief wait at a red light in which to collect my thoughts before peeling away to simultaneously release the adrenaline and burn off any potential flat spots on the rear tires.
There have only been two actual collisions, almost exactly a year apart. The first was during my senior year of high school. I was the last in a bumper-to-bumper line of about six cars following the class float to the staging area for the homecoming parade, traveling around 4.6 mph, when an elderly chap pulled out of a diner and drove smack into my driver-side door. I had to crawl out the other side, which in a Datsun 260Z isn't as easy as it sounds. She needed a new door and some paint work, but that was it.
The next year, also during homecoming week, I picked my little sister up from school one afternoon. While stopped waiting for traffic to clear so I could make a left turn, a guy who had graduated with me and had just picked his brother up overestimated his ability to stop on the wet pavement and rear-ended us. That crash required some minor body and frame work and a new gas tank.
I've had a few harmless solo spins and several near-misses dodging folks who tried to pull out into my path, but there was one about 18 months ago that really rattled me. One day on my way to work I almost got run over by an 18-wheeler. I was in the left lane at about 45 mph and accelerating, rolling beside a 50-ish blonde lady in a Chrysler 300M, burgundy with beige leather. I remember that distinctly. A tractor trailer was in the median/turning lane, with his left turn signal on. As I got about 50-60 feet from the tail of the trailer, he decided to start rolling and move into my lane. By the time I got my foot on the center pedal and hard on the brakes, I was about even with the rear wheels, and he was still moving over. I pushed harder and locked up both front brakes. The stripes on the pavement lasted for months, and all I saw in the mirror 1.8 seconds later was smoke. I had already started turning the wheel slightly to the right so I could slip in behind the Chrysler, but with both fronts locked I was just going straight ahead. I eased off the brakes just a bit as she went past, and shot to the right when the wheels started rolling again. A little bit of luck, a little bit of skill, and a little bit of divine assistance meant I only had a couple of flat-spotted tires when the situation could have been a whole lot worse.
That was one of those situations where you become aware of just how quickly your brain can process information. I knew the truck was coming over, there was nothing I could do to stop that, and no way I could come to a stop before running into/under the trailer. The only way out was to match his angle and pray that the lady in the Chrysler didn't punch her brakes, too. At some point I checked my mirror to make sure there was nobody behind me in either lane (there wasn't), and subconsciously dropped from 5th to 3rd gear as I changed lanes. I NEVER remember to downshift in panic situations. Then came the flood of reactions: anger, confusion, "what the fuck?!," disbelief, awareness that I had not in fact crapped my pants, relief, "thank you Jesus," and thankfulness that not only had I lived through a potentially fatal episode but I also had a brief wait at a red light in which to collect my thoughts before peeling away to simultaneously release the adrenaline and burn off any potential flat spots on the rear tires.
