My Closest Near Miss - WTF!

[snapper_37]

Had a bit of a close shave this morning - still shaking a bit.

Stopped at some lights close to where I work, in primary. Looked over my shoulder and indicated to the car behind I was turning left.

Lights changed so off I went. Turned left, stayed in primary as the factory gates are about 20 yards on the right. Indicated right - nothing coming towards me. The car immediately behind went passed to my left (as expected).

Guess where the twunt behind him thought it would be best to overtake?

To my f*cking right (on the wrong side of the road) as I was turning in. !!

Luckily, I was taking my time on the turn into the gates because of ice. My front wheel missed him my inches only. My language was colourful enough for even the Polish having a sneaky fag to understand

WTF are they thinking of?

<calm>

 

[mickle]

Oh to be allowed to carry heat seeking missiles.

 

[beanzontoast]

Nasty. Glad you're ok. At the risk of repeating myself (but I will) this illustrates again that you can be doing nothing wrong and still run the risk of getting hurt. Which is why I take exception with people who say cycling isn't dangerous. By comparison with other forms of transport it may be safer than some, but to say flatly that cycling isn't dangerous is to run the risk of lulling people into a false sense of security.

 

[snapper_37]

Thanks Beanz. I just can't understand the mentality, unless they think it's some kind of joke, even the passenger was laughing. F*ckwits.

Mickle - I'd love to fit one on my handlebars lol.

 

[HLaB]

My sympathies snapper. I had my closest without contact at the weekend, is it the season for it?. I was heading round a rab (turning right) when a blacked out Range rover decided he wasn't giving way and straight at me. Fortunately he saw me at the last moment and slammed on the brakes and it had only just started to spit so his skid was short and he missed hitting me side on by inches. Bizarrely enough other than typing about I was quite calm on this occaision.

 

[magnatom]

Nasty! It's the 'it's only a bike' mentality. For a small proportion of drivers, we just don't count.

 

[BentMikey]

Nasty. Glad you're ok. At the risk of repeating myself (but I will) this illustrates again that you can be doing nothing wrong and still run the risk of getting hurt. Which is why I take exception with people who say cycling isn't dangerous. By comparison with other forms of transport it may be safer than some, but to say flatly that cycling isn't dangerous is to run the risk of lulling people into a false sense of security.

By your measure walking to the shops is about the same sort of dangerous. Do you live in a cotton-wool padded room?

 

[hackbike 666]

I agree with beanz.So long as there are twunts in cars then cycling isn't as safe as it can be.Take the equation of cars away then the biggest risk is falling off.

 

[nilling]

Why didn't he undertake you like the first car? SMIDSY?

I feel your rage - you've done everything by the book, it's icy to your taking care and still some twunt driver feels the desperate need to overtake at all cost


Handle bar mounted missiles hmmm..

 

[wafflycat]

Nasty. Glad you're ok. At the risk of repeating myself (but I will) this illustrates again that you can be doing nothing wrong and still run the risk of getting hurt. Which is why I take exception with people who say cycling isn't dangerous. By comparison with other forms of transport it may be safer than some, but to say flatly that cycling isn't dangerous is to run the risk of lulling people into a false sense of security.

NEWSFLASH! LIFE IS DANGEROUS! EVERYONE WHO LIVES WILL DIE!

Nothing, but nothing in life is completely safe. Everything we do has risks attached. It's about understanding what the risks are and the chances of something adverse happening and what steps you can reasonably take to keep the risks to a minimum. In the great scheme of things cycling *is* safe compared to many, many things we do in life. And no-one is done any favours by overstating risks by a flat "it is dangerous" approach.

And whatever you do, *don't* go to bed. People die in their beds.. and people are injured by tea cosies!

Edit: see http://www.cyclechat.co.uk/forums/showpost.php?p=551950&postcount=6

 

[BentMikey]

I agree with beanz.So long as there are twunts in cars then cycling isn't as safe as it can be.Take the equation of cars away then the biggest risk is falling off.

That also applies to walking anywhere, which has a roughly similar risk, but I doubt very many of us would class that as dangerous.

 

[wafflycat]

Glad you're ok snapper

 

[beanzontoast]

By your measure walking to the shops is about the same sort of dangerous. Do you live in a cotton-wool padded room?

How on earth do you get to that!? I didn't say that people should not cycle any more than I said they shouldn't go shopping!

Cycling has dangers associated with it and that some of those dangers are unrelated to whether the cyclist is doing anything wrong. "I'm a safe cyclist - I won't get hurt" is not a good attitude. Vigilence is everything on the road. Never underestimate the ability of other road users to behave contrary to common sense (or the Highway Code).

Giving out a message to the contrary is not telling it how it is. That is the point I made.

 

[snapper_37]

Why didn't he undertake you like the first car? SMIDSY?

That's what I couldn't get my head round. When I first stopped at the lights, there was only the one car behind me. I can only think that the fool came bombing round the corner, but he would still have seen me moving from the middle of the road to turn right.

It doesn't make sense.

I don't think the passenger could have SMIDSY'd me as I looked straight at his smirking fizzog!

!!

I've had a lovely Blackcurrant and Nettle tea, have apologised to the staff who overheard my vulgarity so all is starting to look ok again with the world. I've got a feeling I will have my wits about me even more than usual tonight.

 

[Eat MY Dust]

I was doing a similar maneuver on Friday night, signaled to turn right with a car behind me. As I pulled into the road end the guy in the car shouted "ar*ehole" I shouted back "c*ck" his face was a picture.