Promise I won't do another long post today....
Frightened. She was, quite literally, sitting there shaking and wondering what to do. I'm sure she was so scared that she didn’t even wonder if I was a nice person or not.
I have 3 daughters, 2 of whom drive. I would hope that if they had a similar incident that someone would stop for them. All she really needed was a bit of advice on how to get the car over the kerb and back onto the carriageway. It was one of those paved, 3 food wide, road separation areas and the car was completely straddling it although, at least, pointing the right way.
If you’d seen it you would expect her to panic. I drive a 2 ton car which handles like a barge in the ice and snow, I felt my back end break away and immediately controlled it and started to dump speed, when I immediately had to avoid a car which was coming from my left, spinning and out of control. It was touch and go as to whether I hit her or not. Then her car slammed into the kerb and bounced over it, still spinning and came to a stop facing the right way again. I’m sure a lot of people who have never experienced that kind of thing would be absolutely terrified.
When I walked up she’d been racing the engine and trying to use the power of the engine to get herself out of it. A losing proposition in ice and snow. I calmed her a bit then got her to put a full right hand lock on and…. Slowly…. Back the car up onto the kerb. She kept racing the engine and I had to calm her again. Then I got her to slowly drive forward and drag the back wheel over and stop again. I gave her a bit of general advice about how to handle this kind of thing (no brakes, steer gently, don’t hit the accelerator) and sent her off to park then walked back to my car.
I was quite impressed with her in the end. She should have rolled the car when she hit the kerb, I was expecting it and prepared to take avoiding action so I didn’t make the situation worse, but she managed to control it enough to just be stuck. When she left she was calmer and not racing the engine any more. I would not have been surprised if she had been in total pieces. I was prepared to park the car for her, if needed, but it was really better for her own confidence if she drove it herself.
Ah well, my bit of excitement for the day. We spend a dull 2 hours arguing over inbound and outbound dependencies for a long list of activities of which the most common comment was “what does that really mean”…
Back to dull boring project management work.