• Welcome, Guest! We hope you enjoy the excellent technical knowledge, event information and discussions that the BMW MOA forum provides. Some forum content will be hidden from you if you remain logged out. If you want to view all content, please click the 'Log in' button above and enter your BMW MOA username and password.

    If you are not an MOA member, why not take the time to join the club, so you can enjoy posting on the forum, the BMW Owners News magazine, and all of the discounts and benefits the BMW MOA offers?

What items have you dodged or hit on your commute?

Things we've dodged, eh? Let see, in southern Utah headed into one of the parks there was the full can of beer hucked at me from the window of an oncoming pickup truck. I ducked and swerved, the can went over my shoulder and exploded on the road behind me. On I-25 between Cheyenne, WY and Denver I dodged an aluminum extension ladder that suddenly appeared from underneath the truck in front of me. Dang thing had been hit once or twice already but fortunately was lying nearly parallel to the roadway so I could miss it. I allow a lot more space cushion than I used to when following vehicles!
Things I've hit? Excluding wildlife (deer, rabbits, javelina, various fowl) the only thing I've ever hit was a two-foot-high traffic cone coming into Grant's Pass, OR. I was traveling eastward and blinded by the crack-of-dawn sun and didn't see the cone until it went WHAP! and disappeared under the left cylinder then bounced down the road behind me. It was a good sign I needed to stop for a coffee break, and besides--for some reason it struck my funnybone and I was laughing so hard I damn near fell off the bike!

Let's all be careful out there,

GTRider
 
Things flying off the roofs of cars and sailing and fluttering toward you are out of your control, BUT.... If you are constantly running over so many things that appear from under the car in front of you, I think it's time you increased your following distance to give you some time to react. One of these days, that piece of angle iron may not hit your CAT after bouncing from under your front tire, but just might take your foot off at the ankle.

It's not always possible to follow in safe distance. Other cars will pull into any open space in front. Angle iron bounced down the road from a jeep that hit around 75 yards in front, and sent it flipping and hopping.

Me hitting things doesn't really happen that often, but I've been commuting since '76, so things are bound to happen. Thanks for the word of caution, though!
 
Road Hazards

I have dodged many things along my travels,a few stand out more than others.Like the time I was on interstate 26 north of Charleston S.C. following a roofers truck not too closely and I noticed that the ladder on the truck was moving from side to side on the ladder rack.Then all at once the ladder stood straight up,stood perpendicular to the rack and then flew completely over and behind the truck then was dragged a short ways behind it until it broke free and pirouetted around and around the three lanes in front of my bike.I was all over the brakes and swerving around tring not to run over the ladder and not get hit by other traffic.The truck continued on down the road without even slowing down, ladder slid to side of passing lane and stopped parallel to the road.On another adventure I had also been following a Summer camp bus pulling a trailer full of canoes,out of the one of the canoes blew out what appeared to be a 5 gallon bucket,it bounced all over my lane if front of me,I swerved to miss it,thinking that I was about to crash,I braced and hit it full on and it bounced off my engine protection bar to the side of the road.I did not crash,pulled over to see what I hit,it turned out to be a nice new Slumberjack sleeping bag.I tried to chase down the bus to return the bag to its owner,could not catch up to it after securing it to my bike.I now have a very nice sleeping bag.On another trip as I was following a fishing lure bouncing down the road in front of me on a long straight stretch of highway,way up ahead of me was a bass boat on trailer,the lure was attached to a nice fishing pole and reel that was in the boat, the pole bounced out of the boat and now its mine.Has caught many freshwater fish for me.:D
 
It's not always possible to follow in safe distance. Other cars will pull into any open space in front. Angle iron bounced down the road from a jeep that hit around 75 yards in front, and sent it flipping and hopping.

Me hitting things doesn't really happen that often, but I've been commuting since '76, so things are bound to happen. Thanks for the word of caution, though!

Your argument is weak and a cop-out. Do you remember your high school drivers ed? A student will always say what you said, that another car will fill the space you were keeping for safety. The reply to that is, ease off and increase your following distance.
 
Running over a turtle is like hitting a big rock rock - Michigan

A face full of poop from a crane flying above me - Mississippi River in northern Illinois

Bugs at night that covered my face shield, windshield and head light with bright red guts - 30 seconds and I pulled over - somewhere in Oregon at night. Used my drinking water to clean things so I could proceed.

What looked like black bugs. Slowed down. Turned out to be chucks of a tire from a semi. If I had not slowed down, the recap would have taken me out when it flew off the wheel. Somewhere in Florida

Crossing a narrow country bridge in Ohio Amish Country, a hawk departed the road kill it was dining on and hit my left mirror and my shoulder. No real damage to me, but got a small collection of feathers.

Several furry four legged critters - both daytime and night...including one huge raccoon...in several states

Came around a blind corner, again in Ohio Amish country, and found myself sharing the road with a herd being driven back to the barn. I pulled over to let them pass. Then a bull mounted a cow and did this thing while they moved past me. Later on the road, behind a liquid manure sprayer that was dripping...not a pretty sight or fragrance. Slowed down and backed off until he turned into the field he was going to spray.

Came up on a cattle hauler semi somewhere on an uphill grade in the Rockies. When the hill got steeper the exhaust from the cattle ran out of the back of the trailer and made life interesting.

Picked up a 20 penny nail in my /5 back tire on a back road in Kansas. My buddy took the wheel and tire into town while I sat on the side of road with my bike center stand on by rocks to raise it up. Only two cars passed in the three hours it took for him to get back with my repaired tire. After that I always carried a spare tube...and today tire plugs.

Was in northern Arizona. Off in the distance a very large RV was stopped in the road so I slowed down. There was a huge range bull in the middle of the road not letting the RV pass. When the bull looked a me, I slowly turned around and rode away. Went 150 miles out of the way to get where I was going. No contact, thank God.

Open face helmet, rural Michigan. A hornet came over the windshield and into the helmet by my right ear and temple. Several stings before I got stopped and able to remove the helmet. The hornet flew off.

I'm sure there are many more, but my memory fades.
 
Voni and I were riding across the Missouri bootheel on a two-lane blacktop highway. I was in the lead. I noticed a fairly large flat piece of corrugated cardboard lying in the road. I think it was a flattened cardboard box. I was in the right wheel track and also meeting a semi but passing the cardboard was a non-event for me. Just as I was past the cardboard it was blown up into the air by the passing semi. That is of course where Voni and her bike were.

I glanced in my mirror just in time to see the box flat against the front of her bike - headlight and helmet face shield were covered by the cardboard. She couldn't see anything straight ahead. But she (apparently) calmly reached up with her left hand, grabbed the cardboard, and pulled it away to her left. We pulled over to gather our wits.

The cardboard, and the grit on it from being run over several times, left scratches on her headlight, the fairing, and her helmet faceshield.
 
Years ago commuting to work on my NightHawk 650 I got behind a guy with a rowboat in the back of his pickup. The boat was not secured at all and I thought it might slide out so I was ready when it did.
 
Going 70 or so on an Interstate in traffic, I was confronted by a 20-30 gallon plastic garbage can a few years ago.

It rolled into my lane, and as with Joe's experience, I was too close to dodge. There was a thump as the bike's front end rode over it, and a buzz-thump as (I think) it briefly was stuck beneath the bike before the rear tire went over it. I was surprised that the bike did not even wiggle alarmingly, although I can confirm that my adrenal glands got a good workout once they figured out what had happened.

"Driving a car" I hit a plastic bucket too, after it flew out of the back of a service truck in front of me. Busted my fog light & bumper cover paint job messed up. I was in hvy traffic with multiple lanes & in urban St.Louis during daylight rush hour. When I was told it was my fault I ended up talking to the Vice-president of Claims(or better put, "howdowegivethemtheshaft") and I distinctly remember the guy asking me if the bucket was air born(and thus supposedly unavoidable) or lying on the highway (as if you could simply drive around it) to determine if they had correctly decided against me by assigning fault. I lost my large claim free discount & after asking "which way was my fault" I lied & kept my discount after the call.
Another time I hit an orange cone as I rounded a ramp/curve and took out a PU headlight & they didn't take the discount then with no discussion?
Moral: watch what you hit and HOW you hit it...
 
Your argument is weak and a cop-out. Do you remember your high school drivers ed? A student will always say what you said, that another car will fill the space you were keeping for safety. The reply to that is, ease off and increase your following distance.

I will repeat that cages where I'm from will absolutely cut in front of you if there's any chance at all (young sailors on their way to base). We're moving fast. Dangerous? Yes, I try to maintain a car-length or two when at all possible - it's inconceivable to actually put a car length in between for every 10mph as I was taught back in '66. Main goal is to get to work and home, safely, through whatever. Always scanning, never daydreaming. Nonetheless, stuff happens. If you travel daily, things will occur, hence the title of this thread - What items have you dodged or hit on your commute.

Now, as an aside, since you are named ClassicVW, my first was a '63 Bug, then a '58 Bug, a '64, then a '67, then a '76, then a '74 Karmann Ghia. Good cars, all!
 
Now, as an aside, since you are named ClassicVW, my first was a '63 Bug, then a '58 Bug, a '64, then a '67, then a '76, then a '74 Karmann Ghia. Good cars, all!

Great cars! I don't know if I can recall every one I had or built, but they included a '65 Bug convertible Porsche red with Porsche wheels, a '68 Bug, and a '74 Super with factory metal sunroof.

I'm always on the lookout for either a notchback or a squareback. ( I know, Lots of luck! )
 
Not sure if this qualifies as something I dodged or hit, but...

Commuting to work on local circumferential highway a few years ago on a R1150RT. Got caught in the right lane behind an open semi. Traffic in the left lane was heavy and there was no getting around the truck, but I was not in a hurry so I settled in for the few miles to my exit. Noticed some tan/brown spots showing up on the windshield. Did not think too much of the spotting until a I realized the cages on the open semi were full of chickens. The liquid spots on my RT were chicken poop. Gear kept the poop off my work clothes, but pulling the gear out of my sidecases before the ride home was nasty. Nothing like putting on gear lightly sauteed in chicken mess for most of the day. The bike smelled pretty bad too. Gear and bike got a thorough cleaning when I got home. I make a point of staying well away from chicken trucks. :)
 
Yes, I try to maintain a car-length or two when at all possible - it's inconceivable to actually put a car length in between for every 10mph as I was taught back in '66.

A car length or two? You are tailgating 99 percent of the time! And what you were taught in '66 was totally wrong even then. Appropriate following distance is determined by time, like two seconds minimum, not car lengths. The car in front passes a pole or delineator. You should be able to count a full two seconds before you pass that same object.

Yeah, I know, it can be difficult on some major metropolitan roads maintaining proper following distance, but you should never give up entirely...

Harry
 
I'm always very careful to limit the time I ride near open trucks and keep a good distance from all other vehicles. So guess what I got to dodge in Missouri.
The topbox from the bike ahead! Never even considered that as a threat! They bounce real good.
 
I-25 through downtown Denver during rush hour - pickup truck with a stock rack hauling new tires lost one overborard. Luckily I went under it between bounces. The motorist behind me wasn't so lucky as the tire landed squarely on their hood. That was enough - I let the RTD bus driver do the driving after that when I had to commute into D during rush hour!
 
Besides Deer and Moose the oddest thing I dodged was a couch in the middle of the road traveling home (NY) from Daytona through Georgia 2 years ago. I had plenty of time to slow down but there is that moment where actually seeing a couch in the middle of the road doesn't immediately make sense to the human brain thus the delay time factor. And I mean with the cushions and everything looking right on it. Didn't fall off a truck/car.

What I have "hit" (or hit me) was traveling on a Honda CL450 someplace in Indiana many miles in a cloud of stink wet funk that was starting to make me almost vomit. I tried to outrun the smell and mist but it only got worse. Eventually I caught up to a tractor trailer hauling hundreds and hundreds of pigs in open cages. Ahhhhhgggg, I was drenched in swine urine +?
I had to go to one of those self-cleaning car washes for the bike and myself.

Learning to drive in the early '70's I recall we were taught in H.S. Drivers Ed one (1) car length for every ten (10) miles per hour.
Not realistic but that's what they taught.
 
Last edited:
Learning to drive in the early '70's I recall we were taught in H.S. Drivers Ed one (1) car length for every ten (10) miles per hour.
Not realistic but that's what they taught.

Actually, not as far off as today's experts would have you believe, particularly with the cars back then and typical speeds about 60 mph. At 60 mph or 88 feet per second, two seconds is 176 feet. That divided by 6 (for 60 mph) would be 29 feet. So six car lengths wasn't even enough at 60. For today's sized cars you need more like 8 or 9 car lengths at 60 mph to have 2 second following distance.

Yee gads! They taught me to tailgate in driver's ed in 1959. :)
 
I described the two-second following distance as a minimum. They now teach a three-second following distance.

Harry
 
2 guys passed me going down a dirt road in a smaller car holding a canoe on their roof. The driver and passenger each having an arm out the window holding the canoe down. They passed me doing about 45mph and a few seconds later the front of the canoe caught some air, flies up about 25 feet and does a flip, right in front of me. Luckily I had some room to avoid the obstacle now lying in the road.

Riding thru Kansas during a wind/sandstorm last fall I tried driving perpendicular to the wind for a few miles. Not a good idea as I had to dodge and then was struck by several tumbleweeds. Yes, they do hurt and I won't do that again.

Nothing like riding with your full face visor up and have a bee fly in with the visor shutting closed as I tried to shake the bee out. I was lucky not to get stung.

I did not see this but my buddy lived near a pig farm. The road that went by the farm was perfect concrete with a set of banked S turns that we used to take as fast as we could. Coming thru the esses one morning on his 69 Bonneville a full grown pig was right in his lane. He had no time but managed to hit the pig square dead on. He didn't go down and the pig walked away.
 
Riding back from the MOA Rally in Missoula Montana we were headed north along Flathead Lake, a truck loaded with
firewood lost a piece that bounced in front of me. Having little time to react I ducted down behind the windscreen and
the wood careened over my left shoulder. My wife who always looks over my right or left sides was watching this unfold
had to dodge the piece as well.
We contemplated have an adult beverage at 10:00 am to settle our nerves.
 
Back
Top