I read he farmer was just pulling the blocks out of the way to stop someone driving into them without warning.
For me,there is nothing in the film that suggests he is concerned with public safety.
All I can see is a weapons grade roaster.
Could wuite easily have torn the sidewall of those big rear tyres off with that manouvre.
Bear in mind that could be a 5 grand tyre....Never mind the damage to the trailer wheels which pinged off the corner of the concrete blocks too.
As for the Citroen DS3 driver. Seriously, how moronic do peope have to be. A car is generally the most expensive thing most people own other than their house - the ease and abandonement at which people just go charging in to these floods astounds me - its not like its not ALL over the media, news, internet etc every single year when we get floods. What, if anything, is between their ears!?!
My lesson from this is if there's a bunch of people with cameras standing by the side of a road wondering if I'm going to make it...I'm not and I should just turn around or wait.
The preview photo of that video looks like one of those made up exaggerated clickbait ones.
I read he farmer was just pulling the blocks out of the way to stop someone driving into them without warning. Who knows.
Seriously doubt that - big trailer with a front axle, full of empty potato boxes, wouldn't be the tool of choice for pushing two concrete bollards from a metre deep ford.
Seriously doubt that – big trailer with a front axle, full of empty potato boxes, wouldn’t be the tool of choice for pushing two concrete bollards from a metre deep ford.
I think he probably thought that the big boxy bit on the front would just push them in front of the tractor. Instead he ended up going right over them.
It's a box with a concrete weight inside which is likely removable. He didn't lower it to the ground (you can see the linkage at 1:07 for anyone who's not familiar). Once the front wheels rose up, he must have known what was happening and then took a risk of beaching the tractor, damaging the underside or the steps etc. If the front wheels of the trailer had climbed over, the concrete barriers would then likely be stuck between them and the parking legs of the trailer (2:11), or possibly beached the trailer on the side safety rails.
Were those the closure barriers he ‘collected’?
Custodians of the land. Could you imagine how that weapons-grade bell-end would react if he perceived that a cyclist was holding him up?
I imagine the driver was a contractor who had been hired the day before. He’d probably seen the YT vids of splashy fun and now had any empty road and a big tractor to play in
Bet he still doesn’t get tractor contracting jobs
All tractor contractors are the same. Normally on their phones , skidding to a stop, widening roads because they never can stop for traffic
Tractor driver seems to be an absolute whopper. The Citreon driver - does the guy pushing them out say something about them ignoring his warnings not to try it? I think the last thing in the world I'd be doing is wading into the water to push them back out if that'd happened, I'd be where all those idiots with the cameras are pointing and laughing.
I've watched a few of these Rufford Ford videos in the past and it just shows how moronic large sections of the public are, myself included for watching that garbage!
He snapped off part of the trailer drawbar (the support/shoe that holds it off the ground) and pushed it through the ford, you can briefly see it when he is pushing the blocks at the end.
I don't think it's true that he was intending to move the blocks, just about any farmer would have something with a bucket or forks that is better suited to the job.
YouTube gold though, that video will be raking in views and earning ad revenue for years
He snapped off part of the trailer drawbar (the support/shoe that holds it off the ground) and pushed it through the ford, you can briefly see it when he is pushing the blocks at the end.
Good spot. 1:47 where it was, 2:15 on the floor.
Could you imagine how that weapons-grade bell-end would react if he perceived that a cyclist was holding him up?
A few years ago, I had an altercation with a tractor driver on a single track rural road who reversed his tractor and trailer down the road after me just because I suggested his tractor was too big for him. I truly believed he wanted to kill me and can’t think where I have ever sprinted so hard. It was about 500m to the main road where I knew I might have a witness should anything happen.
As a result of that incident, I’ve learned to give tractors right of way and where ever possible, keep out of their way.
It really annoys me those folk who see something like an icy pavement and think 'time to set up the camera' rather than doing anything to warn people or mitigate the problem.
However this doesn't seem to be one of those times!
The Citreon driver – does the guy pushing them out say something about them ignoring his warnings not to try it?
This was the exchange;
Camera: We were all yelling!
Bloke: You what sorry?
Camera: Everyone was yelling stop stop!
Bloke: They told me not to drive through the f c mate. The moment she comes [to this?] she says don't drive through it, she comes to me like a t**t.
Camera: It made a horrible noise.
Bloke: Yeah it's dead.
Camera: Oh yeah.
Bloke: It's dead.
I think he's talking about the (woman?) in high-vis you can see just as he drives into the ford. I think the suggestion is she startled him, or at the very least he won't take instruction from a woman!
This was the exchange;
Camera: We were all yelling!
Bloke: You what sorry?
Camera: Everyone was yelling stop stop!
Bloke: They told me not to drive through the f c mate. The moment she comes [to this?] she says don’t drive through it, she comes to me like a t**t.
Camera: It made a horrible noise.
Bloke: Yeah it’s dead.
Camera: Oh yeah.
Bloke: It’s dead.
I think he’s talking about the (woman?) in high-vis you can see just as he drives into the ford. I think the suggestion is she startled him, or at the very least he won’t take instruction from a woman
Nah, the woman was driving and it was her he was moaning about. You see her after wafting the water out of the drivers side. He got out the passenger side and the exchange went-
Camera: We were all yelling!
Bloke: You what sorry?
Camera: Everyone was yelling stop stop!
Bloke: I told her not to drive through the f c mate. The moment she comes to it, she guns it like a t**t.
Camera: It made a horrible noise.
Bloke: Yeah it’s dead.
So many written off cars... Stupid waste.
Classic bit of One-life-live it bellendery at 17:30
I can understand the mechanically uninclined not quite getting the risks of engine damage. But how the instructor thought going up to the windows in a big standard hatchback was ever going to work?
and the defender with the snorkel - that’s an awkward conversation with whoever installed it - was it not actually connected?
Some driving instructor don't actually know much about cars or really "get" driving.
and the defender with the snorkel
That's a Suzuki Jimmy and judging by the state of it it had already been through at least once before they tried to be clever and drive under the bridge.
The Defender is much earlier on - 4 minutes or so into the vid
Oops - freelander not defender. But yeah, at ~4.00. Full snorkel, water barely over the headlights and it conks out.
It would be interesting to hear from an insurers perspective, when there is ( potentially) deliberate damage to a vehicle.
That’s a Suzuki Jimmy and judging by the state of it it had already been through at least once before they tried to be clever and drive under the bridge.
That's pure mud. He's been out completely effing ruining some byway into a no go area for anyone else.
One life, live it...
It would be interesting to hear from an insurers perspective, when there is ( potentially) deliberate damage to a vehicle.
My dad wrecked his car driving through a flood, he'd previously leant a car to a friend who crashed that as well - 2 X total losses in a short space of time equalled refusal to insure for a while, but he got another friend to put him on their insurance untill those losses became historic.
From what I've seen some insurers have an exclusion about being driven deliberately into deep water. Otherwise they might go with a "causing deliberate damage" exclusion.
But it's generally subject to a careless/reckless assessment - so should the driver have taken precautions. Like looking at the signs, stopping, slowing down, taking another route, driving according to the highway code, etc.
Or did the driver go into the water unknowingly.
If it's reckless, the claim would likely be declined. If it's careless then hopefully it'll get paid. Evidence is going to be very important here, but frankly given the staggering levels of buffoonery (and social media coverage) at Rufford I doubt many insurers will be looking to fork out willy nilly for those claims.
It used to be nice at Rufford, lines of kids on the footway and you got a cheer if you splashed them.
Harmless fun and a useful shortcut. Washed the underneath and wheel arches too.
More than once I turned around because the water was too high, you could tell because it looked bloody deep and a lot wider than usual.
Muppets the lot of ‘em!
Work colleague has just bought a cheap insurance write off Volvo XC70 project that's been hydraulic'd in deep water and bent a con rod.
This popped up on my Youtube suggestions just now. I watch a fair bit of the Auto Shenanigans channel, he's very good. This was filmed in November 2022 just before they first put a road closure in for the ford. Some interesting history about the place too.
An automotive Darwin Award.
Lol at one of the comments on that YT video
"And that ladies and gentlemen is why aliens don’t make contact"
I cannot help but think that if someone is standing by a flooded part of road filming everyone who goes through that it is time to find another route…
Also, the massive broken down, flooded truck twice the height of some attempting it.
It really does worry me how far removed from the outside world so many people are, and driving around.
I see it's near Centre parcs never seen the ford but my son and myself used to disappear to the kart track most days just outside the over rated holiday park although great to cycle round when your kids were young 25 years ago
I'm guessing it's still a fairly expensive week away compared to flying off somewhere
For balance, near Hawes both Burnt Acres Road and the main A684 east both flood, and they flood quickly. The number of Dunning Kruger trapped keyboard warriors who will proclaim "why did those idiots drive into water that deep" every time it gets posted on facebook goes a long way to explaining why those people got trapped in the floodwater. They probably broke down when it was <1ft deep, that it's over the windscreen of their T5 30min later wasn't the original problem.
Fastfoward a couple of months and it's raining again, someone drives into it because it's 'only' a few inches deep, not the meter+ it is in the bad photos, the water continues to rise until the car looks properly flooded, breaks down, and the cycle continues.
I have not bought a Ford for some time. Is there an issue?
[edit] I typed that wrong, the car's break down in what appears to be quite shallow water, then 30min later someone takes a photo of it up to the windscreen and calls them an idiot.
It takes surprisingly little water to kill some cars it seems. I presume in a lot of cases it's the electrics rather than the air intake. Conversely there was a video of a Nissan (Qashqai?) pushing a bow wave higher than it's bonnet with seemingly no adverse affects. There are idiots out there undoubtably, but I don't think people realize quite how little water it takes to break down. Even down here in Reading I saw a Focus stranded in about 6-8" of floodwater (my feet barely got wet passing it), I presume it must have just taken an unlucky splash to something electrical.
They probably broke down when it was <1ft deep, that it’s over the windscreen of their T5 30min later wasn’t the original problem.
So the problem is still that they drove into water that was too deep for their vehicle. Whether it's 30 or 100cm doesn't make them any less stupid.
It takes surprisingly little water to kill some cars it seems. I presume in a lot of cases it’s the electrics rather than the air intake
As i recall from the old Rufford videos BMWs were notably worse than most. The air intake is low and if water gets anywhere near bonnet level it'll likely end in tears. I wouldn't deliberately take mine through more than a deep puddle.
On the other hand, that may be just confirmation bias on my part!
So the problem is still that they drove into water that was too deep for their vehicle. Whether it’s 30 or 100cm doesn’t make them any less stupid.
Yea, but my point was you can wreck a car in water that wasn't even deep enough to warrant a change of socks when I got to the office.
There's idiots who get stuck in water, and there's idiots who get lucky and attribute it to being a driving god.