Whoa...interesting near crash...

[Nexus-6]

First off, not me or the Viper but because of the Viper...

I'm about half way through the process of breaking the Viper in - just a touch under 500 miles as of tonight. I take her on 30 minute drives (a'viperin' my wife calls it) every other night fairly late - just get out and cruise listening to her sing while adding up the miles towards the magic 1K mark...

Anyhow, I'm out and about a bit early tonight. Stopped at a four way intersection. Traffic is light but a small group of cars is coming to a stop for their impending red light to my right. I get the green and take off as they are still slowing to a stop...I glance at one of the cars as I pass through the intersection and they're giving the snake the 'Ka look' (the dizzy-swirled-eyed, glazed over oh-my-lord drooling face that you all know quite well).

Shift into second and look back to see this same car slowing to a stop...in the middle of the intersection! With another car headed straight for it that had been coming up behind me before my light had turned green! This at-speed car swerves into the grass median to avoid this sudden road block, flies over the median, comes to a stop on the other side of the road (2 lanes each direction separated by a median) before flipping around and heading in the opposite direction they had just come from - no doubt confused, ********** and in shock.

The thing that really surprised me is that the passenger in the road block of a car was still looking down the road at the Viper!

I've heard about this happening before, but it really surprised me to actually see it happen...has this happened much to you guys? Did it actually ever result in an accident?

It's right on the fence between "Whoa - what other car in the world has that kind of pull!" and "Whoa - someone could have died right there - and I indirectly had a part in it.."

Strange feeling....

For what it's worth - the Viper pulls harder to 4K under 3/4 throttle than most of my other cars at full song (zr1 being the one exception)

I need to take another road trip this weekend!!

 

[Bob K]

I know what you mean.

A couple of years ago some of us from the Washington VCA convoyed up to Whistler, B.C. for the weekend. On the way up we were traveling on a curvey mountain road (obeying the speed limit of course) when we came upon an accident in the oncoming lane. The traffic in that lane was backed up for miles. This meant that our 8 Vipers attracted a lot of attention from the poor people waiting in the backup. As we rounded a curve we met an SUV full of young people who immediately devoted their entire attention to us. Little did they know that they were about to encounter the stopped cars ahead of them. Too late to stop, they slammed into the back of the last car in line and debris went flying. The last Viper in our convoy had to swerve onto the should to avoid being hit by airborne car parts. The lead cars in our convoyed had no idea what had happened until we told them on our radio.
Leaves you with a guilty feeling even though you did nothing wrong.

Bob K

 

[Nexus-6]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bob K:
Leaves you with a guilty feeling even though you did nothing wrong.

Bob K

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

It did - even though the other driver was heads up enough to avoid the accident and nobody was injured or worse.

 

[Vreracing]

Well known phenomenon.

Driver stares at Viper.

Forgets to look at traffic.

Nearly causes accident.

Its worse than Cell phones.

 

[Kurt 97 GTS]

Had a similar thing happen to me a couple of years back. While driving down Preston Road a driver was checking out the Viper and pulled out from a parking lot without looking to his left for traffic. End result is that he got T-boned!!(ouch!!) Felt bad for the guy, but what can ya do!?

 

[KenH]

Vipers aren't always completely innocent in this accidents.

I had a middle aged looking couple in something like an older Chrysler ****** dogging me through town. They just kept right on my butt until it was starting to tic me off. It was obvious that they were trying to make some kind of point, though I had no idea what it was other than they were jerks. I made a few lane changes to try to shake them, but they stayed right with me.

As traffic cleared, I sped up a bit which of course they matched and stayed ******* my tail. At that point, I negotiated a hard 90 degree right hand turn onto a freeway on-ramp at a pretty good clip. When I looked up in the rear view mirror, they had made it around about 45 degrees of the 90 degree bend and were in the process of doing a 180 out through the down-hill grass median. I watched long enough to ensure they made a safe stop. I blame that one on the Viper as well, but a man's gotta know his limitations.

--- Ken

 

[CarDude]

The Mustang I just traded (on the Viper) had the same effect on some people. I was driving down the interstate, during rush-hour, traffic came to a quick stop and this guy beside me was staring at the Mustang and not the stopped traffic. He rear-ended this car right beside me...that was scary, I thought he might swere into my lane or something.

Here is a picture of that Mustang...hope she finds a good home.

You must be registered for see images

 

[Don]

It has been a while, however, I had a gentleman that had pulled up next to me while we were traveling southbound on Academy Rd. He must have drifted a bit from me because as we entered the intersection I heard the crash. Looking into my rear view mirror, it was obvious that he wasn't paying attention since he had hit a car that was waiting to turn right onto Academy Rd. from Airport Rd.
It does give you a rather guilty feeling even though you did nothing wrong.

 

[V10 ACR]

I had something similar happen to me. I picked up the car from the seller to drive home (900 miles) and in the mountains on I-8 a Ford Excursion towing an empty flat bed wanted to get a better look at the Viper. I was doing maybe 75 mph and as he was catching up he passed a slow moving big rig. As he passed the rig, the trailer he was towing caught some air and started to fish tail. After several violent shakes back and forth the trailer came off or broke the hitch. At that speed the safety chains failed and the trailer went over the side. The driver came very close to losing control himself and almost followed it. I felt the guilty "did I cause that" feeling, but the driver should have know better than to drive that speed with an empty trailer.

 

[malcoll]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Vreracing:
Well known phenomenon.

Driver stares at Viper.

Forgets to look at traffic.

Nearly causes accident.

Its worse than Cell phones.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Watch out.... they'll be comin' after our Vipers wanting to ban them from the roads as a distraction!

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKKKK!

Later,
Lance