Ems was hit by a car tyesterday

[hk blues]

As per message above, sometimes we pedestrians forget/don't realise that driver's cannot see all around them - there are blindspots.  It happened to my wife, son and I on Saturday night - we were going for some chicken and the store owner was reversing their 4x4 into the store space, almost hitting all 3 of us.  I was about to have words when he got out when i realised we had chosen a bad place to cut into the store area and with my wife and son being petite he could hardly be blamed for not seeing us.  

The other 99% of the time it's down to poor driving.

[Gary D]

31 minutes ago, hk blues said:

As per message above, sometimes we pedestrians forget/don't realise that driver's cannot see all around them - there are blindspots.  It happened to my wife, son and I on Saturday night - we were going for some chicken and the store owner was reversing their 4x4 into the store space, almost hitting all 3 of us.  I was about to have words when he got out when i realised we had chosen a bad place to cut into the store area and with my wife and son being petite he could hardly be blamed for not seeing us.  

The other 99% of the time it's down to poor driving.

What bugs me is a security guard etc waving you out and standing infront of the reversing sensors whilst doing so and effectively blinding you to obstacles.

[gery0x]

Well, those low speed incidents mostly end up pretty lucky for everybody involved - but as speed and recklessness increases it can become really really dangerous here!

I had one very risky incident which I'd like to recount for you.
It's maybe a little bit off-topic here but please bear with me;

I once had to go from Davao to Manila for a one-day trip, so it was only me and my backpack.
Back then I didn't have a car so I took a taxi to go from my home in Davao to the airport.
For those familiar with Davao City, the following happened at Diversion Road where it goes downhill from the mountain, around 500 meters before the (now finished) bridge;

It was around 11 PM and the taxi driver goes fast as hell, no traffic, open roads.
Then he tried to overtake a big fat lorry - on the right side, of course! - and he changed back lanes quite a big little bit too early.
During the maneuver, the lorry (who was speeding like shit as well!) hit the rear left side of the taxi, swinging it into a 180 degree turn and sliding it into the left side of the road.
On the left side of the road there was some sort of chicken stall or something like that.

I saw what was coming so I ducked, laid down flat at the back seat and covered my head.
Boom, crash, glass shards everywhere - we crashed into the chicken stall with no less than around 40 or 50 kph!

After a couple of seconds I raised my head and outside were already the obvious bystanders with their cellphones...
I couldn't open either of the doors because they were wrecked so I kicked the right side one open with full power.
The whole taxi was covered in blood - but it was chicken blood and not human blood thank goodness!!
I was totally fine, and very very very lucky - 2 meters to the left of said chicken stall were a bunch of steel beams stacked facing the road, they might have pierced me, the driver and the whole taxi into pieces!

So I grabbed my bag, jumped over the taxi where the driver was standing scratching his head.. "how could this happen???"....
I asked him if he was okay and told him that he's a hell of an idiot.

Coincidentally another taxi driver stopped out of curiosity, so he was the one to take me to the airport at last.
Needless to say, taxi #1 didn't receive a single Peso for the ride so I only paid around 40 PHP for going to the airport *lol*

Anyway, that was when I decided to drive BY MYSELF here instead of relying on reckless taxi drivers (especially at night)!

 

P.S. (edit): the lorry driver of course drove off hoping that nobody saw his license plate...

Edited January 7, 2020 by gery0x

[Arizona Kid]

8 hours ago, Tommy T. said:

I heard from a friend when I first arrived here and bought my motorcycle that there really is only one rule: Don't hit anybody!

He should have advised you to get a louder horn!

[Tommy T.]

Just now, Arizona Kid said:

He should have advised you to get a louder horn!

He was already horny!

[Tommy T.]

9 minutes ago, gery0x said:

I had one very risky incident which I'd like to recount for you.

That is a very scary story, gery0x. I hated reading it, but thank you for sharing it... Glad you were unhurt. I hope the taxi driver, at least, got a bit of a ticket... You never know here what happens...

[Arizona Kid]

36 minutes ago, Gary D said:

What bugs me is a security guard etc waving you out and standing infront of the reversing sensors whilst doing so and effectively blinding you to obstacles.

Those guys used to irritate me so much. Not the security guards, but the other guys that decide to direct parking in front of an establishment. Now I just give them a few coins like the other drivers do, even if I don't need their help. Better to go with the flow than to resist. Much happier life.

[gery0x]

20 minutes ago, Tommy T. said:

Glad you were unhurt. I hope the taxi driver, at least, got a bit of a ticket

I don't know what happened to him... I tried to find the story in the news days later, but nothing.

[Arizona Kid]

29 minutes ago, gery0x said:

Anyway, that was when I decided to drive BY MYSELF here instead of relying on reckless taxi drivers (especially at night)!

I don't drive at night anymore. I can't take the chance of hitting some kid running across the street because of my tinted windows. It would devastate me if I killed an innocent kid. If I need to travel at night I hire a driver.

[Tommy T.]

The ones that really frighten me are when I drive the few times at night and somebody crosses the road in front of me and I can barely see them - dark skin, dark clothes... and they still don't even seem to look in the direction of oncoming traffic...