Rollover caused by "large owl"

They also get a little blinded by the headlights, losing their depth perception which I think is why they get too close to the vehicles and get hit. That and I think birds found that is fun to get close to fast cars and ride a wave of air up like surfers do in the ocean. Same thing with the big windmills, those blades can whip around at 70 miles per hour and create a vortex of air, but sometimes the bird, usually raptor gets sucked in and struck, falling to the ground to die a slow agonizing death.

 

Several years ago I was cruising a country road through a local Nat'l. Forest when a d**n turkey came out of nowhere and blew my windshield out. It didn't completely penetrate it and bounced off the side somewhere. I managed to keep it on the road, but had to nurse it back to Ryder (company I was with was leasing tractors) at a max of 30mph or the d**n windshield (single piece, Int'l. Prostar) would start to buckle inward.

Guys at Ryder were skeptical until they saw all the feathers mixed in with bits of safety glass all over the cab.....

 

Turkeys are Scarry. Like a big cannonball floating in slow motion.

 

I was driving two Marine Corps Sergeants Major around Camp Lejeune North Carolina in a Humvee one day. The one SGTMAJ kept smacking me on the back of my head with his rolled up map and using the map to point at the speedo in the middle of the dash (these guys were in the back seat) because I was going too fast. Anyway I see this big tom turkey at the bend in the road coming up, he's all puffed up and strutting at the cars going by. The hummer we were in had the green canvas conestoga style covering the bed area, and flapped something fierce at 45 miles per hour. This big ole tom turkey didn't like the flapping noise, probably took it as a challenge of some sort and flew up at the most inopportune moment and smacked his body into the passenger windshield, cracking it all up. The big bird lay flapping and dying on the side of the road behind us as I came to a stop with visions of the rest of my short lifetime in Fort Leavenworth Kansas death row dancing in my head. SGTMAJ wasn't too upset though, he just pounded me a few extra times on the back of the head with his rolled up map. We got back to CIC and before the Hummer was even stopped he was out the door running in to blab that his driver had a confirmed kill.

 

My company had a truck hit a turkey in that area last month. Pretty sure it was within a couple of miles of this incident. The bird flew right into the windshield. It missed the hood somehow. There were feathers everywhere in the cab of that truck. When they sent me the pictures all I could do was laugh.

 

Reminds me of the time I was riding up US95 through Calnevari. Crows or possibly ravens in the fast lane eating. Took off came into my lane and smacked my helmet. Stunned the #### out of me, my instincts kept me up while my brain tried to process what happened. I was probably at a steady 75 since I always do the speed limit through towns in the middle of nowhere. Good thing I didn't hit it before I got there.

 

Years ago hit a hawk on 80 about 10 miles east of council bluffs with an fld freightliner , wiped out the Center post and both windshields .
After cleaning out shorts drove er on into Omaha .
Hit a turkey with a 780 Volvo near falls city ne a few years ago square in the center of the windshield and didn't even crack the glass .
The good ole boy coming at me when I hit it didn't miss a beat and had that bird by the legs tossing it in his trunk by the time I gathered my wit's.

 

Never have been a fan of the two piece windshields.

 

Then there was the pheasant near clear lake ia ...same fld ..hit square on driver side mirror and mirror was undamaged but side of my truck looked like I had butchered a steer on it .

 

I just always carry a dead owl with me. When they get to stinking too bad, I throw them out the window on the fuel island at the nearest Flying J. Then I get a new one.

They come in handy for all sorts of things...

"Sorry I was speeding officer. This here owl flew in my window and attacked my dog."

"No sir, I couldn't fill out my log book. This owl came and ripped out all the pages to use for its nest."

"Sorry I'm late for my appointment. I had to rescue this owl from a burning building."