We were heading out of London on the M1, on our way to a Yuletide feast at Cousin Hoavis's, when a police car with flashing lights and wailing sirens brought all three northbound carriageways to a stop. "Excuse me, officer, why have you stopped all the traffic?" "Well sir, this gentleman in the black Porsche 911 has inadvertently executed a 180 degree turn and slammed into the crash barrier with such force as to wrench the rear offside wheel way out of alignment." Now, as is visible from the photo above, there's a gentle curve on the road, and the 911 does have a tendency to swing tail-out during extreme cornering, in in situations like this (with a 50 mph/80kmph speed limit in force) there's no excuse whatsoever to be driving at such high speeds and executing such violent manouevres as to bring about an accident like this. The outcome I'll leave to the magistrate's court and the insurance company.
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I'd say it looks like a football player, except the car's too cheap! Perhaps a Sunday League reserve.
My first thought was 'So how long did they keep the whole road closed?' and that was prompted by this little rant hiddin inside a car review
http://tinyurl.com/2sukcd
Here in Poland in our my neck of the woods (Chylice) we have our own little White Christmas. We had an inch or so of snow fall a few days ago and the trees and ground are coated in a white frosting as far as the eye can see. Less than 2km away towards Piaseczno where we spent Wigilia with our inlaws there isn't any snow. It's really strange driving to and from our private winter wonderland. The family is coming over tomorrow for dinner so they're for a surprise.
That fellow definitely is a prat - reminds me of the one who kept flashing his lights behind me going uphill one snowy winter's day two years ago. My car isn't the fastest going uphill anyway, and I knew there would be a snowdrift on the top of the hill, which is totally exposed to the wind blowing across it. I let him pass, and guess whom I found on the top of the hill, looking rather sheepish and talking red-faced and excitedly into his mobile phone, with the paint of his nice new blue car now decorating the right-hand crash barrier? Of course I did NOT drive by with a broad,slightly nasty grin on my face, no, not me! :) It was a good thing only his ego was hurt, and I hope he learnt the lesson!
Driving from Manchester towards Derby on Boxing Day, we found ourselves once more in the immediate aftermath of a crash brought on by a surfeit of speed and stupidity. This time is was a souped-up Vauxhall Astra, which ended up 90 degrees to the road, nose in a ditch. It must have happened a minute or so before we got there. Once again, the speed limit was a camera-monitored 50 mph. Poland seems to be losing its crown as Europe's capital of bad driving (well, anecdotally, anyway).
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