I got side-swiped by an 2wd Excursion today. He was passing on a 2 lane road with oncomming traffic. When he realized he was going to have a head on with a COE semi, he swerved into back into my lane. He first took a practice swerve when his front fender was even with my door, then the real thing and hit his rear axle into my steer axle. I was already on the brakes since I first saw him pull out and with a 30' or so drop off on the right side about 2 feet from the pavement, wasn't much left to do but watch. The studs on my axle tore up his tire and rim leaving deep gouges in the sidewall and destroying the bead area on the steel rim but thankfully didn't blow it out. My front bumper raked the #2 door hard enough it wouldn't open, ripped a 3" gash in the door jam and then ripped a 10" gash in the rear fender from the tire back before finally folding forward.
Damage to me was a $400 bumper and about $20 worth of chromies on the lugnuts. Damage to him was guestimated by the patrolman at $6000.
To give the Excursion credit, the suspension handled it pretty good. After he got around my front end, he went into a slide on dry pavement at about 10-15 degrees off axis, this at 70+ mph. He steered into the slide and recovered about the time the right front dropped off the edge of the pavement and at least he had the wits to bring it to stop without jerking back up on the pavement.
What a day.
It gets better.
After I get out and start walking up to him to see if he's ok, 5 kids climb out of the back. FIVE!
While waiting for the law to show, he said he was late for a ballgame, and only 1 of the kids was his. Also, the first swerve was a "Warning" that he was comming over and I needed to get out of the way. I think that about sums up the SUV mentality anymore, it seems like about half of them try bluff others out of their way by using size.
1 positive note though, the patrolman was talking about a strong possibity of 5 charges of child endangerment.

alanscott


[link:ford-trucks.com/users/alanscott/|http://www.ford-trucks.net/users/alanscott/clubftesml.jpg]...Click!

 

Glad to hear that nobody got hurt! It was a good thing that you were driving a heavy truck instead of a pickup or car. Things could have been a lot different for you. Parts are never to expensive to replace when comparing the cost to the cost of a life. Five children. Unbelievable! I have been there many times myself. People don't realize what it takes to handle a heavy truck. They think that you can stop the thing on a dime, let alone thinking about your load shifting. It seems that you have to know what everybody else on the road is thinking or doing anymore. I have been on the shoulder many of times because of people trying to pass on a busy two lane highway. It can get ugly but nothing nasty so far, knock on wood.

Jakegypsum // Ford fleet, soup to nuts.

 

[font color="004499"]
John Wayne said it best:

"Life is tough. It's tougher when you are stupid."

That SUV driver is lucky to be alive. He'll be even luckier if his insurance premium isn't as high as his mortgage from now on...


>=oD[/font]

 

been down that road before, i drive a strong arm dump truck which can carry 23 ton of cargo and one day i was fully loaded(maybe even a bit over) when this brain fart in a chity luv pulls out in front of me and i caught the bed of his truck and copletely ripped the back end off spun him around about 4 times.It was kinda comical to watch that little truck spinning around and the guy inside bouncing around like a cork in a pee pot.

 

well im glade all is well and all that happend was they got shook up.BUT 5 COUNTS OF CHILD ENDANGERMENT!!!!!!!!!??????????
wow this should shake the wind out of all of those that are reading this. why? you ask.well it just show how taranical our gov has become.this means that tis person could go to jail pay an outragous fine and lose there children.Wow and y'all are for the child endangerment thing.how sad.

could have been you with your little nieses or nephews.going to get a bag of ice or something for a bbq at the house.would be so great then would it.i say let the each childrens parents deal with it the way they want.no one was hurt.and as for the bully thing i dont buy into that.it was a first reaction to the situation.you know "GET THE HECK OUT OF THE WAY" thing.you would have done it in a Yugo if you were driving.


https://www.ford-trucks.com/dcforum/User_files/3a987c78441b90c8.gif




https://www.ford-trucks.com/dcforum/User_files/3a98299615e4afbe.gif

 

> Wow and y'all are for the child endangerment thing.how sad.

I'm definitely for it, though I think that the choice of whether to bring charges against him should probably be left up to the parents of the other kids in the car. However, I can understand how sometimes the government has to step in when parents demonstrate that they lack the responsibility (or intelligence, or common sense) to be able to care for their own children.

At the very least, this guy should lose his driver's license - at least for a while. From the sounds of it, it would make the roads safer for the rest of us...

> could have been you with your little nieses or nephews.going to get a bag of ice or something for a bbq at the house.would be so great then would it.

Personally, I would hope that most readers of this board would be smart enough to avoid trying to pass into oncoming traffic with 5 kids in the car, especially in a vehicle as slow and poor-handling as the Excursion (not to bash the Excursion, but they are most decidedly NOT sports cars).

LK