Scariest situation you have been in?

I've only been doing this for two years but the scariest incident I had driving was last year for a construction company driving a dump truck. I was heading eastbound to our dump site on a posted 80km/h road doing the speed limit. The road was one lane in each direction and I was coming through an intersection that had yielding entrances for the cars travelling north to east. Off to my right I see this little Honda Civic coming up to the yield portion and slow down. All of a sudden the guy decides he wants to make a u-turn directly in front of my truck and I stood on the brakes as hard as I could. He saw me at the last minute and I swear I could see that his life was flashing before his eyes. He managed to stop just before I attached the drivers side to the passenger side. My fingers were dug into the steering wheel like Steve Martin in Trains, Planes and Automobiles.

 

I can't compete w/ JohnBoy, or Ironeagle... Thank God!
My most disturbing was seeing an accident in oncomming traffic, and bodies flying... watching traffic avoid collision and not knowing what debris they just ran over rather than stopping. (3 died)
And seeing nearly identical accident play out 2yrs later, in my rear view mirror on a curve.(2+1unborn died) GOD ######! why won't someone listen to CB? Turn the squelch up so you don't hear the idiocy, just leave it on so you hear 1/4mile... please!
Those two bother me more than any thing that I've ever gotten into... and that's alot!

 

Northbound i-95, Georgia, around 1993.

I'm pulling a food grade tanker. Van in front, van behind. Plenty of room and fairly light traffic. We top a small rise to find a mini van pulled well off the shoulder, creeping along. Not enough notice to move left. Front van passes by with no problem. I'm setting up to hug the center line and ease past, when the mini van activates his/her signal and merges directly into my safety zone.

I got lucky. There was just enough opening to my left that I was able to make a (frighteningly sudden with a tank) lane change. I had already grabbed the mic to warn the rearmost truck, so I started hollering "northbound, he's comin' out. Getovergetovergetover." Then my mirrors filled up with smoke and pieces of mini van. The truck behind me hadn't been so lucky.

The minivan was occupied by several children. None of them made it. I couldn't have missed them by more than 1/2 inch.

I still think about that one quite a bit.

 

I was coming home for Christmas my very first year driving a truck. It was the day before Christmas Eve. i was all set to get home. Was coming from virginia Beach, heading west on 64 just west of the WV/VA state line by maybe 18 miles. as you know, its pretty mountainy there. Well it started to freeze rain. i was talking with 2 other drivers just in front of me who were also heading home. We were all three dead heading. Well, it become REAL slick REAL fast. we got to a bridge, i want to say maybe 20 miles or so into WV, and its a good 60-70 feet or so high. theres a slight curve in the bridge, so its cambered to allow for safer turning as most curves are. that day, that off camber of the turn made for a scary ### ride! to top it off, just on the other side of the bridge, on the shoulder, was an ambulance with its emergency lights on, just sitting there....so we naturally aimed to avoid it..lol the first driver, made it just fine. the second driver, which was right in front of me, got onto the bridge at about 15 MPH, and all of a sudden, the sheer gravity caused his empty trailer to slide sideways down into the gaurd rail. it bounced off and away he went... I was up next. i was a bit nervous to say the least...lol well i figured, water runs down hill, so i figured id take the turn on the bridge, higher up towards the right rail hopping there would be less water to freeze up there. lol....all it did was give my truck MORE room to slide down into the lower rail...i ended up looking straight over my hood, OVER the high guard rail, looking out my drivers window to see where im going down the road....on a bridge thats nearly 70 feet or so high..lol. it all seemed to take forever, but eventually my truck straightened itself out as well.

needless to say we all got off at the very next exit and called it a night. hell of a first winter for me! lol...btw, no damage to either trailers thankfully...

 

I was riding with my boyfriend a couple of months ago and he had a very similar situation on 95 in Florida, but thankfully he was able to avoid a collision. It was scary as hell. I'm still not sure how he managed to steer the truck, pull the air horn, warn the trucks behind him and still manage to not plow into the van or any of the vehicles in the other lanes (traffic was moderately heavy) all at the same time. I'd have been a complete basket case if any of the kids in that van had gotten hurt.

 

You, sir, earned your "bread and keep" for a lifetime there.

 

Last night. Dallas TX. Leaving Motiva rack w/8800 gallons of gasoline. Going down Singleton about 25mph. 2am. Car runs stop sign. I swerve more than I normally would. Truck surges like Hell. Car barely misses my front right fender. He floor boards it and gets in front of me. Look in mirror. 2nd car with three guys hanging out w/ pistols in hand. 1st car is keeps trying to keep me between him and maggots trying to kill him. Finally just forced his car onto grass medium and he makes left and off they go. About 10 blocks later they cross in front of me about 2 blocks. Still hauling it and that's the last I saw of them. We are not supposes to carry. But I know others do and I may be soon. What's that old saying? Rather be judged by 12 than carried by 6.

 

Well I have a couple of them, I think I will tell you about the time I was going through St. Louis Mo. I was headed east and the traffic was heavy, there was a pretty good rain going on as well, I was as far left as I could legally be, We were approaching an interchange and on the far right was a car accident off the side shoulder but that had not caused any traffic back up, But as soon as we came around the curve, I looked ahead of me and all of traffic was stopped and now I was about as new as can be, I had still been working on my shifting and so forth, So I started the procedures to get this truck sitting at 78950 with half tank of fuel and a load of beer!. all I remember was me looking and seeing traffic stopped and me getting me truck and load stopped safely! I don't remember anything in between, I'm sure I did what I was taught in training. Thank God for Prayer I'm sure between grabbing gears and pinching the seat with my cheeks! I did something right! Stay safe out there. Good Luck.