Thank your Guardian Angel here - because you were dumb

[The Ouzo]

As much as we like to think we're perfect we are infact not. We all make mistakes, but sometimes those mistakes could have been much more disastarous. Sometimes you just have to believe a guardian angel stepped in.

 

This morning I'm riding my usual route. Slight downhill, slight tail wind. Its dark so I'm mostly relying on lights of other vehicles to tell me where they are. I'm heading to a traffic light that is out of order. Visibility to both side is normally pretty good, so I scan left and right, fingers on the brakes ready. But at this time of the morning there is usually not much traffic about, although this morning there are 2 cars to my right that have come to a stop treating the traffic light as a 4 way stop.

I head into the intersection, as I cross the white line where you should stop I see a Gautrain buss coming from the right, it is far into the intersection. I hit the breaks, realise I'm not stopping in time so start swerving left. Its at this point the bus driver sees all my lights and reflectors and hits the breaks allowing me to pass around the front of him.

100% my fault, based on where the bus was when I saw it and the speed at which it was moving, the driver had to be in the intersection before I even got there. How I did not see it i dont know, but had it not been for the bus drivers quick reaction this could have ended VERY badly. Very stupid and careless of me, a wake up call to stop being so complacent. I spent the rest of the ride quietly thanking whatever higher powers intervened whilst mentally kicking myself in the butt.

 

The point of this thread ? To highlight the fact that we all make mistakes, but to also highlight the silly mistakes we make to hopefully alert other of these so they can be aware to not do the same thing.

[BuffsVintageBikes]

Eish, wake up call indeed.

I had one on Sat while descending Chappies towards Noordhoek on a wet road on my gravel bike. It's the only bike I own where my brake lever are swopped around. I always have my front brake on the right to match my motorbikes, but here it's on the left. I've been meaning to change it for ages but just haven't gotten around to do it because it's hydraulic and a bit of a pain to do.

I was fully in control going through a tightening left hander until my rear tire let go and started sliding. My mind thought I was applying front brake so I squeezed the front harder to scrub off speed but making it worse because it was rear. I missed the apex of the corner, went over into the oncoming lane, which very fortunately had no traffic in it because it was still early and almost went over the retaining wall. It was only many years of riding motorcycle that saved my bacon because I immediately started modulating both brakes to scrub off enough speed to stop me going over wall.

I was lucky, it was my mistake, I shudder to think the consequences if there was an oncoming car or worse, I went over that low retaining wall 😲 I almost gave my mates behind me heart failure as well because they saw the drama unfold.

[Fred van Vlaanderen]

56 minutes ago, The Ouzo said:

As much as we like to think we're perfect we are infact not. We all make mistakes, but sometimes those mistakes could have been much more disastarous. Sometimes you just have to believe a guardian angel stepped in.

 

This morning I'm riding my usual route. Slight downhill, slight tail wind. Its dark so I'm mostly relying on lights of other vehicles to tell me where they are. I'm heading to a traffic light that is out of order. Visibility to both side is normally pretty good, so I scan left and right, fingers on the brakes ready. But at this time of the morning there is usually not much traffic about, although this morning there are 2 cars to my right that have come to a stop treating the traffic light as a 4 way stop.

I head into the intersection, as I cross the white line where you should stop I see a Gautrain buss coming from the right, it is far into the intersection. I hit the breaks, realise I'm not stopping in time so start swerving left. Its at this point the bus driver sees all my lights and reflectors and hits the breaks allowing me to pass around the front of him.

100% my fault, based on where the bus was when I saw it and the speed at which it was moving, the driver had to be in the intersection before I even got there. How I did not see it i dont know, but had it not been for the bus drivers quick reaction this could have ended VERY badly. Very stupid and careless of me, a wake up call to stop being so complacent. I spent the rest of the ride quietly thanking whatever higher powers intervened whilst mentally kicking myself in the butt.

 

The point of this thread ? To highlight the fact that we all make mistakes, but to also highlight the silly mistakes we make to hopefully alert other of these so they can be aware to not do the same thing.

Glad you are okay.

[Thomo]

3 hours ago, The Ouzo said:

The point of this thread ? To highlight the fact that we all make mistakes, but to also highlight the silly mistakes we make to hopefully alert other of these so they can be aware to not do the same thing.

Agreed - we all make mistakes.

Another reason to drive/ride defensively and also anticipate the mistakes others may make where possible. (as it appears the bus driver may have been doing)

Glad you're telling the story yourself. 🙂

[The Ouzo]

2 hours ago, Fred van Vlaanderen said:

Glad you are okay.

 

13 minutes ago, Thomo said:

Agreed - we all make mistakes.

Another reason to drive/ride defensively and also anticipate the mistakes others may make where possible. (as it appears the bus driver may have been doing)

Glad you're telling the story yourself. 🙂

Thanks, me too.