By Mark Esposito, Weekend Blogger
Somewhere across the space-time continuum a universe exists where the traffic gods actually do care what happens on the roadways. Evidently, our world has collided with that universe in the black hole of Lakeland, Florida. There, a local resident captured on video a cosmic exercise of justice for a tailgating driver who just couldn’t wait for her to make her turn. Flipping off the amateur videographer as he rocketed on by, the gods have exacted their revenge on 33-year-old Jeffrey White –and they must have a sense of humor. The unidentified motorist said, “He just started tailgating me and I’m looking in my mirrors and I’m like dude, what is going on. I didn’t even realize he shot a bird at me until after the video because I was focused on the road.” (video after the fold)
Here’s the video:
Jeffrey White of Tampa was arrested and charged with reckless driving and leaving the scene of a crash.
Source: abc News
~Mark Esposito, Weekend Contributor
Pat:
Generally they resemble interstate freeways, one difference is more often there are guard rails next to the left lane often with no soft shoulder. They also tend to have better merging where possible. A bad situation, which happens unfortunately too often, is what is called a “Stau” which means backup, where cars ahead come to a near stop and the ones behind are at high speed. You will see cars near the stau hit their emergency flashers to warn of the deceleration. This is one reason the hazard button on German cars is so prominent so you don’t have to search for it. They try to miniminze stauen by keeping the ramps as open as possible but it is not always the case.
The lanes also are a little wider, which helps and the road maintanence seems to be better. If you want to drive at high speeds I would recommend you get some kind of training to do so because the situation is very different at 130+ than it is at 70. This is more involved than many realize as things such as roadway pitch, gusty wind sheer, vehicle weight transfer, steering-especially steering, and most importantly long range planning is critical. You have to pay attention to what is 1/2 mile ahead or more, else you cannot react in time. In the video below, the driver is on an Autobahn and travels up to 149mph. Look at the smoothness for which he is driving. Rough, sloppy, and jerking steering will cause harmonic like rolling in the suspension and can tilt the car into a pitch where the wind can lift one side of the car up slightly, leading to more imbalance (especially with tire grip) which quickly leads to out of control situations. At this speed you do not have time to react instantly. If it takes 1/2 second to recognize the need to hit the brake hard and 1/2 second to press the brake you will have traveled over 220 feet (3/4 length of a football field) before your brakes will even fully apply. This is why it is paramount to read 1/2 a mile ahead or more. You will travel 1,500 feet in 10 seconds.
Here is the reason. Look at this situation. The driver is watching way ahead, look at the care for his lane usage and calm smooth driving. When the driver has to break hard and gets just behind this other vehicle. If it seems slow but the offending car is travelling 70.
Here is a short example
Darren, thanks for the information. I guess we were all taught to drive differently but checking mirrors and looking far ahead was just something I was taught and passed on. Also, checking gauges on a regular basis, you know, a quick glance. All have saved my butt a few times.
I’ve driven for sustained periods at 120 mph across the salt flats when there was no speed limit on Interstate 80. It was dicey.
pete, I heard on a news show last week that Idaho had increased their speed limit to 85. And pete, what you describe in Florida sounds a lot like California.
I watched the first video again and I swear that if someone would have left that much room between two vehicles were I live, especially at rush hours, at least one vehicle would have slipped in between them.
sorry everybody, but here in floriduh we have hands down the worst drivers. everyone is from somewhere else. you’re mixing up tourists from up north who are in a hurry or are lost and the navi is telling them to turn somewhere when the signs say no turn allowed. throw in retirees that haven’t been in a hurry for the last 20 years, then add people who live and work here who are just trying to get from point a to point b and dropping the kids off in between.
and if you have the added bonus of an event week/weekend, bike week, race week etc. for daytona or in tampa or orlando, bowl games.
my rant for the week.
p.s. there’s one sob about three houses down from me that one year i’m gonna follow his a$$ back to pennsylvania after bike week and ride up and down his street at 3 am with the exhaust cut off of my car and see how he likes it.
Darren and or nick or anyone else that’s been to Germany, something I’ve always wondered about is driving on the autobahn. Are the entrances and exists there as clumsy as they are here?
@nick spinelli, You must be driving in a different San Diego than I’ve been driving in for the past twenty years, or a different part of it, or at different times of day,. Left lane slow drivers are as common as fleas on a dog in the part of town I drive in at the times of day I drive.
Darren, I would expect nothing less from German drivers. I imagine they are the antithesis of Italian drivers.
I did surveillance for a living. The ONLY time I would ever shoot video while driving was when I was following a subject who claimed they could not drive. It is incredibly unsafe.
Robinh45, It is called common courtesy. This was once fought over in the Sacramento Bee Letters to the Editor. The final blow came from a truck driver with 25 years experience. He said that it was people that think they own the left hand lane, refusing under any circumstance to either move over or speed up was, in his experience, the number one cause of accidents.
If you want to get flipped off or worse just stay there. But it seems to me if we all just treated each other a little more kind instead of one up man-ship, it would be a better world.
Nick
Sorry, I thought you meant LA
I can see you point about the amount of driving leads to better drivers, especially in more crowded situations. In my experience, among general populations, were the best drivers were Germans. They have a more professional attitude I think and their freeways when open in many areas have no speed limit. It is not unusual for 70 mph differences in speed between the inside and outside lanes. In that environment if you pay as little attention as young drivers here do and act like Mr. Road Rage in this article you can get into a mega-crash that is usually not survivable.
Pat, Men are more spatial, it goes back to when we were hunters and gatherers. Now we use it to piss in the toilet even after a few too many beers. Evolution? Spatial recognition is in the genes. You can maybe improve it a bit w/ repetitive muscle memory drills?
RobinH is a left laner, I knew it!! Robin, there are signs EVERYWHERE on interstates saying “Keep Right Except To Pass.” So, there’s that.
Thanks nick, the thing is that although I totally do not like lane splitting it is the law. Therefore, I learned a bit from my son; to settle down and look at things from their perspective. I have now grown to the point that I view the whole practice as lane sharing. I just wish I had his reactions and sense to always be on the lookout for them. I don’t think anyone can now teach me “spatial recognition” but still I try.
When I first viewed this video and saw the first responses I thought we were seeing different videos. In my opinion you can’t film and drive and do both well.
;let me be the a-hole for the day… where exactly in the rules of driving does it say we are obligated to pull over and allow someone to pass by us? and exactly how many of you have driven ONE HANDED? while eating? drinking your beverages? reaching into your glove compartments? adjusting your inside and outside mirrors? or just blowing smoke out ur uh i mean your noses? i saw 2 trucks driving in the left lane
@ 04.00 you can see the back wheels of one truck but then im guessing you all want to ignore that
there is also another truck in front of the first but i dont see anyone commenting on that while he is busy tailgating her…
049 we see the truck again
1:05 we see a suv pass her by why exactly didnt he just keep going? she isnt the one who had the accident but of course we get people on here complaining about HER DRIVING. her eyes obviously werent off the road long enough to get into a accident and run.. and yet she is the villian because she did what was her right to do and not pull over to allow him to pass..
i wonder how many of you would be trying to lay blame on her if she had of pulled over and allowed him to pass for him to only slam into a car carrying a family…..
Woulda, coulda shudda. I’ve been driving for over 50 years, at times professionally, and I would have pulled over. If someone behind you is being a jerk then let it go and move over. One cannot turn on a cell phone, activate the camera icon, make sure the video option is on without taking your eyes off the road—if she has time for all that then she could have and should have pulled over. A rainy day with a slick road and her main concern is taking a video of the guy behind her. And a damn good video given her claim that she never took her eyes off the road and didn’t know she was flipped off until after she watched the video—I don’t think so, she knew exactly how to aim that camera to get the best shot and that was done by looking at the video display. She was as duplicitous as the guy driving the truck, in this case we have one jerk videoing another.
Darren, I’m talking San Diego. LA is a different venue and MUCH different dynamic. But, I still assert Californians are good drivers. They live in their cars. And, there’s a reason Greeks hate the Turks. I’m sure driving is in there somewhere.
C W, Great comment. The info about taking the YouTube video down is interesting. Maybe her attorney suggested it.
Her rudeness certainly could have caused a tragic accident, it may not have been her fault but that wouldn’t diminish the tragedy. She is as much to blame as the rude tailgater….she could have pulled over to let this jerk pass if she wanted to, but like earlier posters mentioned here, she was enjoying boxing this guy in as evidenced by her cackling laugh at the end. The roads were wet, slick and she’s playing stupid games endangering lives. After watching the video I thought she too should have been arrested for recklessly endangering the lives of others.
Pat, Great kid! This lane splitting is insane. The thing w/ boy drivers is while they lack invaluable experience, they can compensate w/ great depth perception, great spatial recognition, and quick reflexes. Get them past 24 years old and you often have great drivers. I have driven in Rome where those Vespa’s literally bounce between cars, and they give the “sorry” wave as they speed on past you. Driving in northern Italy was much more normal. I don’t know if any other state allows lane splitting? Anyone? Wisconsin allows no helmets on motorcycles. So, we are a magnet for many states. But, w/ no helmets, you’re not causing accidents, just putting yourself @ risk, not others.
Well now, we have vastly different perspectives from people watching the same incident. I investigated thousands of cases and never ceased to be amazed @ this dynamic. That’s one of the aspects I loved. If we could only carry this respectful disagreement to more hot button issues it would be superb. As I’ve said, we have made significant improvement the last few months. But, this great discussion should be a template for what we are capable of on more controversial topics.
I’m with Samantha… at first I thought the guy was a total ass, until I watched the video several times stopping the action and paying close attention to the speed of the womans car. She was enjoying boxing him in and totally antagonizing him by not pulling over and just letting him go by, the prudent thing to do. Now honestly folks… wouldn’t that have been much safer on the rainslick streets the gal was sooooooooo concerned about rather than taking a hand off the wheel so she could film and be so involved in making her little drama about road rage. The camera angle was always spot-on so she wasn’t watching the road ahead very diligently. And what if he had hit a car with a family in it instead of a pole? Think about that!!! Last time I watched my opinion of her had gone 360 and her sinister laughing at what could have been a fatality (caused by her) made me sick. She eventually disabled the comments on YouTube… certainly because the tide was turning against her little game and video, whereas she’d allowed them while it was going her way.
the girl is an idiot as much as the guy was. She was purposely trying to piss him off by not getting over. She also was as reckless as he was. Yeah I am sure she was not looking back constantly (sarcasm)
People like her CAUSE road rage.
nick, three things: # 1: I pretty much hate SoCal. I just do not like it all that much and thus avoid it. # 2: In N. Cal. we see what I described on a daily basis, hour after hour. # 3: Having been no further east than South Dakota I’ll bow to your knowledge.
“Pat, God bless you for teaching your son correctly.” Well the boy is teaching me too nick. As you know lane splitting by motorcycles is legal here. One day he was driving in bumper to bumper traffic and he headed the car as far left as he could. Just as I was about to ask him just what the hell he was doing a motorcycle split the lane. He was trying to give that motorcycle as much room as possible. In not so tight situations I’ve seen them give him a wave of thanks after they’ve passed him.