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Bikebouy,
I used to ski-surf (aka goatboat) that break on a custom Dirty Habbit (truro made, prob long gone now). When it's working, the bantham R to L (from the sea to shore) has to be one of the best breaks down there. I've surfed at most of the 'classics' in SW and dearly miss it TBH 😥
OnT
Has to be when we were forced to drive a massive truck (it's LHS) up and over the LHS of an on-coming car whilst negotiating a Corsican coastal road - either that or multiples of 100ft drop to seashore 😯
Worked in Brazil a few years ago from around june 2007 till around june 2009 on a four on four off rotation, the end of the project date was given as 30th may 2009 which meant we had been booked on AF447 on Sunday 31st of May out of Rio.
So we (me and two colleagues) decided we didn't want to get home on a monday morning, so we would get all the loose ends tied up for Thursday night, have the Friday off and have an end of project lash up in Rio before flying out on the Saturday night. So made all the necessary arrangements, got the travel dept to change our flights etc.
So you all know what happened next!
Probably the best decision I have or ever will ever make in my life.
F#####d me up in the head for about six months after and didn't go back to work in that time as it involved flying somewhere.
Also knew three other guys that worked out of Rio for a different company that were on the flight that went down, took that pretty hard as well as we were boasting in the pub to them that we were going home a day early.
When I was working in Germany, I was on my way to see my then GF so that we could go to the cinema. Place was great for getting around on via bike, so I was was giving it some down the cycle track when a convertible BMW 3 series pulls out of a Turkish restaurant car park onto the cycleway. No amount of braking was going to get me to stop in time, but I still tried, and the last thing I saw as I went over the bonnet was his tax disc.
I woke up on the pavement the other side of the car with the driver pulling on my arm (shoulder felt really sore at this point) and swearing at me. Luckily, the polizei turned up , took my side when he got arsey with them and fined him for being on the track.
Diving into a pool as a kid and KO'ing myself for a short period of time, no one noticed and only just made it out...
On the bike, chain snapping when sprinting away from traffic lights on the commute. Ended up hitting the deck very hard and lying sideways across the road in rush hour, luckily there was two lanes so the cars swerved round me - rather than stopping and helping 🙁
Got caught in an avalanche.
Some upstanding members of society from the crays farm region joined the A127 in front of me and a load of scrap metal, pipes, fridge doors etc immediately fell off the back of their caged transit.
A car in front swerved, and caught what looked like one of those old crossed sockets for undoing wheel nuts with their rear tyre, catapulting it up into the air.
I thought it was flying directly towards my face like a massive ninja star. Somehow though it hit the bumper, span up the bonnet over the windscreen without doing anything more than scratching the paintwork & windscreen and smashing the plastic bumper. I had to immediately pull over and just sit at the side of the road. The skidmarks on the road weren't the only ones that day. 😆
I also nearly went over a shear drop in Wales avoiding a motorcyclist who slid off his bike in front of my car (from the oncoming lane). My car at the time had no ABS, so as I locked up it wanted to plough straight on over the edge.
On my 22nd birthday I came very close to going over a cliff into the river Chandra in the back a lorry while hitching a ride in the Himalayas. The driver was bombing up a mountain road with a sheer drop off one side when he fluffed changing down and stalled his engine. The brakes couldn't stop the lorry and it started rolling backwards towards the edge. Just when it was about to go over he turned the lorry in reverse back into the wall on the inside of the road to stop it, rolling the lorry onto its side in the process. Cue 10 fellow students, half a ton of sacks of chickpeas and a few other locals coming down on top of me!
Managed to get out and then it was a matter of helping a couple of injured / people going into shock, and hiking back down to a refuge / chai shop to re-group. Hitched a ride out of the mountain the next day in the back of a 6 wheel drive Indian Army lorry, with the weather deteriating and landslides starting to happen.
The party we had upon making it back to Manali was pretty good!
Just remembered being caught in a rip on a beach just south of Sydney, that got me a bit concerned for a while. Possibly more distressing for the missus who was on the beach occasionally seeing my head bobbing around between waves.
Cheers, Rich
Many of us have probably had more dices with death than we know of, not that car was out of control around that blind bend, etc.
I had one encounter with near death or at least a really painful time back when i was out running one evening.
The barriers dropped across the road as a high speed train was coming through, myself and a mate were jogging along the road and in a moment of thoughtlessness we decided to hurdle the barrier, run across the track, then hurdle the next barrier. The assumption was that it would be a long delay as was often experience when having to stop for trains.
However on this occasion it was not the case, as i cleared the first barrier, i checked left then right as i ran across the track. There to my right was the bright light from the train, closing real fast, as my trail leg cleared the next barrier the train whizzed past. yikes!
The only ever dice with death was 3 times early last year. Only i had a say in the matter one those 3 days. Those circumstances are the only time in my life when i will get to chose when i go. Not to keen now on living y the rules of others.
Stay safe and stay happy out there peeps.
Heading North up the M6 after work, on my motorbike.
Just after the M55 turning, good weather and good visibility. I'm in the right hand lane, car in front pulls in to let me past. I nail the throttle and accelerate hard. On the opposite carriage way, a black car with two passengers (driver female, passenger male - completely irrelevant but a detail that stuck) the front right tyre looked like it exploded and the whole front right of the car appeared to tip forward and dig into the carriage way. This had the effect of lifting the rear of the car up and spinning it 270 deg so the rear end landed on the armco. I was probably at 85mph+ at this point. I instinctively ducked and went under it.
Arrived home some 40 minutes later a shaking wreck. Don't remember the rest of the journey.
I rode my motorbike head on into an oncoming car. I was doing 50-60mph, car around 40-50mph. I ripped my bike in two and put a two foot V indent into the front of the car. I flipped skywards and landed in the trees and bracken. Got a ride home on the back of my mates Fireblade, and was sore for a few weeks after.
starting to learn snowboarding at a small family run ski centre near christchurch in NZ.
got cocky after about 4 weeks and got the lift to the top of the mountain, took a wrong turn in a blizzard and ended up at the top of a black run 'big mama'
crap photo that doesnt do it justice..
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anyway i was stood at the top, couldnt sit down due to the slope, started to get really cold, way out of my comofrt and skill level.
i stupidly thought i could ride it out about a mile to where the slope levelled out a bit, i gingerly leaned over the lip and headed straight down, gatheinrg speed what felt like 100mph, clipped the front edge face planted and flipped over about 10 times.
next thing i know is the local ski patrol guy shouting at me, my mouth full of snow, minus snowboard.
never been near a ski slope since, scared the hell out of me.
I don't know that it was near death but I surprised a bear when I was in Canada. Luckily it just stared at me for a while, didn't get to the point of it bluff-charging me, I think a bit of poo would actually have come out 😯
Following on from the motorways thread and stories of people *almost* being involved, what is your closest dice with death?Mine...
Dad book a holiday to Corfu (our first ever holiday abroad) but mum couldn't get the time off work so he cancelled it and booked on the *same flight* a week later.
The flight.. British Airtours Flight 28M
thats messed up!! fate eh! did you see the 'seconds from disaster'type programme good few years back about it, horrific!
had to abseil off a number 1 RRP
lots of other stuff involving cars, motorbikes and upside down kayaks
Scary how many of us have nearly ended it on/in bikes/cars.
Once I jumped on my mate's back and went flying over him and smacked my head on the fireplace about 2 inches from a spike on the decorative surround of my gas fire.
The room fell silent and we all sobered up very quickly. I am sure it would have been instant death if I had have hit it.
You bunch of soft gets.
None of this comes close to the near miss that Tara Woods and Frankie Orris suffered earlier this year.
[url= http://www.thisiskent.co.uk/date-pasty-sold-Folkestone-99p-Store-fed-year-old/story-13207871-detail/story.html ]Read with caution[/url]
Mine was about 10 years ago now came round tight bend in road under rail bridge in car to have police chase heading straight at me on wrong side of road, they missed me by matter of inches. Had to have a wee stop for the shaking for 1/2 an hour after.
Suppose other time was when neighbours gun dog that know me quite well came bounding into the house and chewed all up my left arm, shoulder and one bite out of my face too - was pretty scary as a kid.
monkey-boy, pure madness! Why didnt you just side slip down? If its any comfort you probably didnt get much over 70 mph on a slope that steep, its not that steep, you can tell by the turns in the snow, and the way the skiers up hill shoulders are not rubbing against the snow, thats when you know your on some thing steep 🙂
Fantastic story Harry 🙂
for me i was driving from banbury to brackley in oxon/northants. i had been driving for less than a year at that point so pretty inexperienced. i was following a chicken wagon, and the driver behind me was getting pretty pissed that i wasn't overtaking it. so, we got to a straight and i decided to give it a go - at the time i just felt so much pressure! so i overtook, but realised i had no chance to get past before the oncoming car hit me. i hit the brakes hard and fishtailed and somehow managed to get in back behind the lorry (from being halfway past it). funnily enough, the driver behind who had been ragging my arse just gave me a solid full-beam blast for 30 seconds.
but that story is nothing compared to my girlfriend's: when she was a kid, she went on holiday with her folks to spain. one evening, after having spent many many hours in a bar, my girlfriend begged her dad (her mum was elsewhere) to go for a pizza. the dad wasn't for turning, but eventually gave in and they trotted across the road to a pizza joint. moments later a drunk-driver careered into the bar they had been in, right through the seats they'd been sat in. thankfully nobody was hurt...
_tom_ bear +1
Camping in the states, I got woken by a bear looking for food outside of my tent, not much fun, i'll tell you
When I was 5 years old I fell out of a car whilst going around a dual carriageway roundabout. Managed to grab hold of the arm rest whilst falling out and was flying in mid air whilst looking back at all the cars behind me that would surely have ground me into the tarmac if I'd let go.
Travelled around half of the roundabout whilst in mid air until my dad could turn off at the next available exit. Even then there was the danger of me letting go and getting run over by our own car. Still don't know how I managed to survive that one.
Still makes me freak out about it even now some 40 years later. My dad gave me a right bollocking aswell.
Got pretty well tangled in discarded fishing line kayaking, pulled me over and stopped me rolling. Popped the deck but was effectively tied into boat by that point, luckily mate had seen go over and did semi-eskimo rescue so I could get me head out of water while another mate got out, waded over to me and cut me out.
Slipped on an icy Tryfan in north Wales a few years back and fell something like 20 to 30 feet. Fell fowards and about halfway down hit a rock right in me nads, rotated through 90 degrees,and smacked the rocks below rather hard. Thought I got away with it until a big blob of blood hit the map case and shock kicked it. Me bits were some amazing colours of blue, black, purpled and yellows for some time after that plus a line of stitches from the forhead into my scalp.
Feel sorry for the chap I scraped down the back of his ruck sack just before I hit the deck. That must have made him jump! I think landing in a bit of a slump rather than head first or feet first saved my from serious injury.
Then there was the time I overcooked my little 205 into a bend, suffered big lift off oversteer and stopped on full opposite lock about 6 inches away from the edge of the road and a big drop into a deep water filled ditch. Don't actually recall winding the opp lock on though. Did the rest of the journey driving miss daisy stylee.
Two of us on a glacier having been up the Allalinhorn. In a heavily crevassed area my mate, who was behind, suddenly disappeared. I saw him go out of the corner of my eye and hit the deck. I managed to hold him and recover him although he had trouble getting out over the lip and fell twice more before I'd properly secured him. We'd practised rescue and it all worked perfectly.
Helicoptered off as he'd knacked his ankle. It was later when the doctor said "There were only two of you? That never happens, always the second man gets pulled down too" . . .
Mine tend to be fairly stupid.
Drunk and fell off a cliff in Darwin. I went thru a tree which must have broken the fall.
Drunk and puked while passed out.
got caught in a rip tide swimming
Pulled a car door handle on the motorway instead of a window handle
Couple of "nearly" falls on mountains
Bitten by a black widow while drunk
had a few mains electric shocks all from being stupid
I suspect I don't have many of my nine lives left
Closest was having a herd of wild elephants chasing after me (and a group) on a remote island in the middle of the Okavango Delta in Botswana. Our unarmed guides had already legged it past us so we just followed as quick as we could. Hid behind a fark-off termite mound with the elephants just 100m away, luckily we had run downwind of them. The sound of elephants trumpeting + undergrowth being flattened behind us whilst legging it raised the pulse somewhat.
Got stuck by falling debris while penetrating a wreck under the Sound of Mull. I was training to instruct wreck penetration at the time and the Dive Leader dislodged cieling material. Took no more than 2 mins to get free but it felt like 2 hours. Pooped myself.
About 15 years ago I was flying out of Biggin Hill in a Cessna 152 I did a descending turn into the path of an ascending Cessna 172. Missed each other by no more than 10 feet...still shiver when I think about it.
18th November 1987. Had been on a trip to that there London to visit the Houses of Parliament with a couple of schoolmates. Stopped on the way back for a Maccy D, then at about 7:30 were going to get the tube back to KX/StP to get our trains home. Decided to go to the pub instead. Most miffed when we did eventually try to go home that the tube trains weren't stopping at KX for some reason.
Sticking rigidly to the letter of the law isn't always the best policy - the pub saved my life.
I went out to Peru and Bolivia 4 years ago and whilst out there decided to the classic mountain bike ride down the "Road of Death" supposedly the most dangerous road in the world, starting off at about 5200m above sea level and going down to the beach in 64km.
We saw lots of organised US companies on good bikes, wearing luminous vest going down slowly, we decided to go with a dodgy local outfit. We paid them for lovely Iron Horse full sus bikes and turned up at the top to find we had ancient Trek hardtails with v-brakes!
About 61km in, I managed to have a complete blow out with the rear tyre which audibly popped and I went over the bars and came to a rest on my back with my feet overhanging the edge with a good 100ft drop straight down. I had managed to dislocate my shoulder with enough force that it pulled off the head of the humerous and stuck the brake lever through my leg also.
Had to then endure 8 hour journey back up the road to La Paz and a hospital, they stuck metal pins in shoulder but completely overlooked where I had stuck the lever in my leg.
So I escaped twice, firstly narrowly missing going over the edge and secondly them finding me in hospital bed the next day bleeding out from leg having lost over 2 pints of blood where they hadn't checked me for any other injuries other than my shoulder.
My only saving grace was that my Camelbak had burst in the fall and absorbed a lot of the impact to my spine.
18th November 1987
I remember passing through KX not long after on a college trip and found it an eery place knowing what had recently happened.
Same really as the OP - the debris of the plane was still sat outside a hangar just off the main runway as a reminder to us all of what had just happened.
Boarding off-piste with my Daughter who was 50yards ahead and going at a fair rate of knots, I felt the snow change suddenly and saw her fall. As I approached her my board 'submarined' and I too fell forward and realised I couldn't move anything except my left arm and was locked solid into the snow. Lying there in dead silence I could hear rushing water 😯 I [b]very[/b] carefully started to dig myself out and 45 minutes later (seemed much longer), after unclipping and lying to the side, I pulled my board out (the nose was about 3 ft below) to reveal a hole and very fast flowing spring melt water.
Daughter thought it was hilarious as being 1/2 my weight had got out in a couple of minutes. I needed a couple of glühwein and a change of underwear!
had pneumonia aged 3.
almost killed me.
Chugg08, wreck penetration is very dangerous. i was married to one for 9 years, proved almost fatal to me.
Once upon a time I was landing a Glider having flown through a squall shower and was undershooting. With wet wings I was having to approach at around 65knots. On the final approach and just I started my flair through the corn tops around the perimeter track on the airfield I struck a large gang mower that was hidden by the corn.
Luckily I managed to keep the aircraft level but the fuselage was ripped open all along one side with several metal (and now very pointy) bars millimetres from my legs.
One false move resulting in a cartwheel at >50knots I suspect I'd have been toast. Worst of all was that my dad was watching from the landing area and couldn't do anything about it.
20-25mph down side of a dirt track, bush grabs handlebars and pulls bike down a ravine, i thankfully go straight on and end up futher down the track with only scrapes.
car turns right just as I'm about to cross junction - headfirst over bars, landed on back of head, hemet saved skull, cambelback saved spine
but the one that still gives me the shivers is the 100 ft fall down a mountainside whilst scrambling. Split leg, split side, grazed scalp and chipped coccyx. I remember thinking that I'll stop soon, but didn't, then realised that if I hit my head it could be bad, just at the point my head glanced off a pointy rock, couple of inches other way or slight angle change and rather than a graze it would have been a hole in my skull. Could sit down for 2 moths and not very good with exposure anymore.
being woken up whilst driving over the rumble strip on the motorway.
x2
Drove a car into oak tree at 80 mph. Luckily the tree was leaning in the direction of travel. The tree acted as a ramp and flipped the car onto it's roof. Then slid down the road, upside down into oncoming traffic. Luckily me a my friends all walked away.
Windsurfing at Sprecklesville, Maui early in the morning. Could hear loads of shouting from the beach, people shouting "shark!" Looked behind me to see a 3m tiger shark. Sailed on a little further pulled the gybe of my life with the shark in the middle of the turning circle (albeit quite a large circle 😉 ) then sailed back right up onto the beach. 2 days later snapped my mast in the same place I'd seen the shark. Had a very scary paddle back.
Returning from Sunday road ride. Got hit directly behind by a Texaco petrol tanker. Flew left and upwards and landed on the roof of a parked car. Feel off the roof, down into the gap between the car and moving lorry. The bike was ripped from my feet and somehow I didn't end up under the lorry with my bike. I ended up in the gap between the lorry's wheel and the parked car. I got up and walked away, sure I was dead. Thinking I'm travelling into the next realm or something. Then a bystander shouted, "He's alive!" at the point a massive rush of adrenalin hit me, the lorry driver turns up saying "Where the **** did you come from?" I then set about punching the lorry driver several times in the face. The police and ambulance turn up and look at me in disbelief that I walked away from getting run over by a petrol tanker.
Necrotizing fasciitis commonly known as flesh-eating disease - due to leaf mould entering wound when fell over on a wet root running in woods and got the scars - forever grateful to the x ray consultant who spotted the tell tale signs when reviewing the previous days plates with his students
I've run from the top of Static Peak in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming in a thunderstorm. We were lazy and set off about an hour late, and didn't make good time up the hike, so were still gathering at the top when the regular afternoon storm came through. Ended up getting an electric shock from a mate as we stood next to each other for a photo. (!?) We must have run for a good 2 miles off the peak back into the treeline. No idea how close we were to a strike, and no desire to repeat that.
Also, had hypothermia in the North York Moors. Day started out crisp and fresh, but turned to rain and hail. Got to the point of not shivering and collapsed in the car park.
Mother Nature eh 😉
antigee - MemberNecrotizing fasciitis commonly known as flesh-eating disease - due to leaf mould entering wound when fell over on a wet root running in woods and got the scars - forever grateful to the x ray consultant who spotted the tell tale signs when reviewing the previous days plates with his students
That right there ^^^ is scary shit indeed.
Driving home from work on a single carriageway road travelling about 45-50 mph and a single deck long bus ( massive old ones that collect school kids) pulls into my lane and hits me head on. Didn't even have time to press the brake pedal!! Impact was so strong my watch snapped off my wrist! Was driving a Clio and was well written off. I couldn't get out and thought it was on fire from all the smoke, luckily an off duty paramedic was a few cars behind me and helped me out. Strange thing was I only had minor bruising and a dodgy knee... In work the next day!! Stupid. Anyways the bus driver got a £200 fine and 9points idiot!!!!!
Static Peak in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
The Tetons are awesome. I heard lightning strikes are common there.
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Windsurfing at Sprecklesville, Maui [b]early in the morning[/b]. Could hear loads of shouting from the beach, people shouting "shark!" Looked behind me to see a 3m tiger shark. Sailed on a little further pulled the gybe of my life with the shark in the middle of the turning circle (albeit quite a large circle ) then sailed back right up onto the beach. 2 days later snapped my mast in the same place I'd seen the shark. Had a very scary paddle back.
Personally I'd have been more worried about some of the local fisherman if it was before 11am. Sharks are all over the place out there but they rarely decide to see how windsurfers taste. We had a tiger siting on the beach I worked on in west Maui one day, the lifegaurds went out swimning with it. Great pictures.
There was one time though that tiger tried took a bite of some French guy at Lowers. He spat him out when he decided he didn't like the taste.