Spring Showers

[ancona]

Well, we just had our first real storm since last fall. The rain was fucking unreal at times, completely blinding drivers. I got off the road for about fifteen minutes, not because I can't drive in the rain, but because so many idiots slowed down to twenty five or thirty because they were afraid to drive through.

Either way, it is much needed rain and my garden will love it.

 

[rblong2us]

My Son was in Dubai recently and they had the 'worst' rain in memory.

He found it very entertaining as there were wrecks everywhere because they have no experience of driving in heavy rain. He said it was the kind of rain that would slow us down to about 70mph on the UK motorways, where driving in heavy rain is a pretty normal experience.

The following day they were playing in the nearby desert dunes on moto cross bikes for several hours, even though it was 35c, because the top few inches of sand was bound up enough for them to get good air time as they could ride flat out in top gear.

He was there getting paid to ride MX freestyle so it was just a great opportunity to experience high speed dune riding, something pretty unique for UK riders.

 

[mmerlinn]

Well, we just had our first real storm since last fall. The rain was fucking unreal at times, completely blinding drivers. I got off the road for about fifteen minutes, not because I can't drive in the rain, but because so many idiots slowed down to twenty five or thirty because they were afraid to drive through.

Sure glad we don't have lolly-gaggers here when it rains. If anything, drivers may speed up in the rain unaware that hydro-planing is dangerous. I know I don't slow down in the rain, not even for curves. Now if we have hard rain (ice), I try to steer clear of all the idiots that have no clue how dangerous hard rain is.

 

[11C1P]

I was always amazed when I was stationed in Germany that no matter how bad the whether was, the rads would drive 180k+ bumper to bumper. They used to have 80, 90, 100+ car pile ups all the time. They had this in several other European countries as well though. I found out why the cars had handles for passengers to hang on to. They weren't common in U.S. cars at the time but were in every car I saw over there. I was driving with a guy down the autobahn one day it was icy, foggy and if you left more than 3/4 of a car length in front of you, someone would cut in front of you. We were going around 110-120k as I remember and pretty much everyone was blowing by us. That's when I gave those handles the moniker of "Oh shit! handles" And sure enough up ahead were several pile-ups. News that night said there were pile up all over the place. When I was over there, or shortly after I got back (can't remember for sure anymore) there was a big pile up over here, I think in the Carolinas like 50 or 60 cars which at that time they said was the largest in U.S. history. They said they were going to look to Europe for what to do to avoid these things. I remember thinking that whatever the euro's tell them do, they need to do the opposite! :grin: