Had an interesting road trip yesterday NF

[Big Cliff]

I was South bound on 35/115 about 6:00 last evening, I was in the passing lane and a black SUV was slightly ahead of me in the sholder lane when suddenly his left rear wheel came off. The brake drum stayed on so I suspect that it was the wheel lug nuts that came out. The driver did an excellent job of hanging on and keeping his SUV under control and headed for the sholder as the wheel and I passed him/her.

 

The wheel shot across the road in front of me and hit the cement divider between the North and South bound lanes bounced a good 6-8' up into the air but fortunatly came back down in the South bound lanes (there was plenty of North bound traffic at the time) but wasn't showing much sign of slowing down.

 

By now I had turned on my beacon lights (I was driving the company truck) and 4 way flashers as there were still plenty of cars coming up behind me and the wheel was still rolling down the highway and criss crossing lanes. I tried to get my front bumper on it twice to see if I could nudge it off the road, we were on a long down hill grade and this thing wasn't slowing down very quickly. Not as easy as it sounds because it was weaving and bobbing all over the place.

 

I was a also little worried that if I did make contact though it might drop and go under my truck which could have caused a whole new set of problems and I finally decided that I would just stay behind it and let it run it's course. Finally about 2 km from where it all started the wheel finally hit the cement divider again and flopped over on it's side right against the divider and clear of the lane.

 

There was no way for me to go back and check on the people in the SUV, by now I had traffic lined up behind me for as far as I could see and I didn't try to stop and get the wheel, I doubt I could have lifted it up into my truck anyway. I sure hope everyone was ok!

 

I got to thinking after how easily that whole situation could have turned into a tragidy; had that wheel gone over the divider and into on coming traffic; had the driver of the SUV not kept their cool and managed to hang on until they were able to get off the road; had the traffic coming up behind me not headed the warning lights......... well, fortunatly, none of those things happened.

 

It does just go to show though, no matter how good a driver YOU ARE, there are some things you just can't be prepaired for!

[bushart]

Holy Smokes!!!

[davey buoy]

That sounds pretty scarry Cliff.Good on you for staying calm and preventing any other accidents.Hard to believe it ended as well as it did.

[akaShag]

I was southbound on Highway 400 south of Alliston one day and the truck in front of me lost a load of full sheets of plywood, all of a sudden there was a very large deck of cards in the air, some going upwards rather spectacularly. I am still not sure how I missed them all, I did go around the truck on the left and just got the heck out of there. Pretty much had to change my underwear afterwards............

 

And have seen a few rig tires bouncing down the road, but thankfully none as close as that one! That kind of excitement I can live without.........

 

Doug