Should you ever swerve your big rig to avoid an animal..??

Well...

At my carrier it goes like this: Put the newb (and in fact any new hire with experience too) in the simulator, and put him in exactly this situation. Any other action than squishing bambi gets you a bus ticket home.

 

What some people seem to be missing here is the concept that the poll was looking at.
This is a situational thing. Mostly referring to the interstate or large US routes.
It is implying that the animal ran or walked into the road right in front of you. In that type of situation you should hit the animal, and have that totally ingrained in your brain.

The times that you should avoid the animal is when you are going down the road and you see that animal from a distance where you have the time to turn on your 4 ways and slow down safely.
If I never slowed for deer I see up the road I would hit 15-20 a year just in Western PA. and NY.
These are Deer that I see from a quarter mile away or more on a smaller road or interstate, and I have plenty of time to safely slow down and nobody directly behind me.

The poll is not about those situations. It is about the sudden ones that come out of nowhere, or in situations where you have very little warning and allot of traffic.
But even in the high traffic situation you better be ready to slow some, because the cars around you are going to swerve and slam on brakes. You are going to need to be ready to avoid the cars.

 

Does anyone know who slaughtered the herd of wild pigs/hogs on I-20 in TX this past week just outside of Marshall ?

Whoever it was, got about 5 or 6 of them

 

On the lines of this thread. I've been known to, and have heard others on the CB, tell others, "Hey, at MM whatever, there's a deer, bear, moose, animal in the ditch, field....."
Crap, I don't want to crack up my truck, and that info is appreciated.

 

I don't have a problem with your opinion, and actually agree with it, except for the word "always".

Hitting the animal is going to be much better than swerving and laying your truck on it's side. Seen this first hand in a four wheeler when my best friend in high school swerved to miss a dog, had the back end of his F150 slide out, bounced off a car, drove THROUGH a Fiero and finally came to rest after he hit a parked school bus.


Sort of a pet peeve of mine, but I hate how the words "always" and "never" keep getting used in reference to driving. I think most people understand that these words mean that the choice is still going to require you to take a look at the situation and make a decision, which in all but that one in a billion situation is going to require that "always" response. But, I do want to point out that those one in a billion situations do happen, which makes an "always" into a "usually" or a "most of the time".

I don't think you're meaning anything different that I'm thinking, it's just that those words bother me. IMO, look at what's going on and make a decision. Unless you can think of a #### good reason not to (I can't think of one, but I'm sure there is one that exists for some set of circumstances), or if there isn't time to think, or you can't make the decision, hit the animal.

 

I live in elk and deer country where there is also lots of winding roads so often one can't see the elk until right on top of them. I've had to make this decision many times. As much as I don't want to hit an elk, I would rather risk hitting one of them than making a sudden action that will put me into a tree, the ditch, into the path of another vehicle, roll me over, send me off a cliff... Besides, even if you do swerve, the animal is likely to bolt in the direction of your turn. Control brake if you can, but keep it straight. Besides like in NASCAR, if you keep it straight, by the time you get to where the crud was, it will have moved itself out of the way... Usually. Like I said, I have been faced with this situation many times with elk and deer and have never swerved. I have also never hit one yet.

 

Yeah but I bet even in those circumstances...stay in your lane and brake/slow down. You do not swerve.

 

You cannot get it back. The weight is simply to much.

 

your wrong........in a tractor-trailer...never applys

 

I don't like always and never as a rule either. I am telling you first hand you do not at any time swerve.