Last night I was out with a lady friend. We had picked a bunch of blackberries and were heading home with delicious Thai takeout. It had been a gorgeous Oregon day and we were wearing shorts, short sleeves, and helmets. I was doing about 55 bmph on a two lane rural road, in the dark, when a fawn appeared in my high beams. It was standing on the side of the road, next to my lane, and appeared unsure of what to do. Mother was standing a little further back, in the grass. I immediately applied the brakes.
The fawn became alarmed with our rapid approach and started accelerating into my lane. In a moment like this there isn't much time to think. I know from experience that one can either brake or swerve, but not both, at least not effectively. So there I was, braking hard as I could, and watching this adorable little fawn run right into our path.
It became inevitable that I wasn't going to slow down enough. Nor was the deer running fast enough to get out of our way.
In a sort of prayer to the spaghetti monster, a cry to the fates, warning to my passenger, and last ditch effort to motivate the deer, I yelled "oh f*ck!" and braced for impact.
A quite tail of bambi vs Pamplona 150
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Th17kit
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Re: A quite tail of bambi vs Pamplona 150
And then?Th17kit wrote:...shorts...55 bmph...rural road...dark...passenger...deer...braking hard.........
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az_slynch
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Th17kit
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THE END: A tail of bambi vs Pamplona 150
OKay I'm back after a brief hiatus. I apologize for what was to be a quick and playul pause turning into more than a week!
I've yelled, I've braced, and I've closed my eyes. The impact is less than I expected, like the feeling of running from 10 feet away strait into a large bouldering pad. The scooter shook for a moment and I opened my eyes to see the deer spinning into the darkness off the side of the road. I had struck the deer just in front of it's hindquarters and tossed it off the side of the road.
Our superior weight of about 500 lbs (270 for the people and 230 for the scooter) was more than a match for the deer. It took awhile to bring the scooter to a stop. I was laughing with the joy of survival and the sheer improbability of the situation.
I didn't find the poor deer, it must have run off. Hopefully not too worse for wear. There is some deer fur in the cracked scooter panels. The impact broke the front shield, the front fender, and the lower guard. It still runs fine and I'm still riding it without any maintenance. Now I'm just waiting for replacement panels from scooterloungeonline and counting my blessings. Oh and constantly scanning the roadside for deer.
I have to admit that I closed my eyes, and thought for a split second that perhaps bambi was the last thing I would see on this fair planet. In hindsight that's better than what a lot of people get to see, but that didn't occur to me at the time.Th17kit wrote:Last night I was out with a lady friend. We had picked a bunch of blackberries and were heading home with delicious Thai takeout. It had been a gorgeous Oregon day and we were wearing shorts, short sleeves, and helmets. I was doing about 55 bmph on a two lane rural road, in the dark, when a fawn appeared in my high beams. It was standing on the side of the road, next to my lane, and appeared unsure of what to do. Mother was standing a little further back, in the grass. I immediately applied the brakes.
The fawn became alarmed with our rapid approach and started accelerating into my lane. In a moment like this there isn't much time to think. I know from experience that one can either brake or swerve, but not both, at least not effectively. So there I was, braking hard as I could, and watching this adorable little fawn run right into our path.
It became inevitable that I wasn't going to slow down enough. Nor was the deer running fast enough to get out of our way.
In a sort of prayer to the spaghetti monster, a cry to the fates, warning to my passenger, and last ditch effort to motivate the deer, I yelled "oh f*ck!" and braced for impact.
I've yelled, I've braced, and I've closed my eyes. The impact is less than I expected, like the feeling of running from 10 feet away strait into a large bouldering pad. The scooter shook for a moment and I opened my eyes to see the deer spinning into the darkness off the side of the road. I had struck the deer just in front of it's hindquarters and tossed it off the side of the road.
Our superior weight of about 500 lbs (270 for the people and 230 for the scooter) was more than a match for the deer. It took awhile to bring the scooter to a stop. I was laughing with the joy of survival and the sheer improbability of the situation.
I didn't find the poor deer, it must have run off. Hopefully not too worse for wear. There is some deer fur in the cracked scooter panels. The impact broke the front shield, the front fender, and the lower guard. It still runs fine and I'm still riding it without any maintenance. Now I'm just waiting for replacement panels from scooterloungeonline and counting my blessings. Oh and constantly scanning the roadside for deer.
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RoaringTodd
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