Highway Thinking

Have you ever been driving down the highway behind a semi, stacked high with pipe?

(no, for once I didn't take this picture)

Have you ever thought, "How would I react if all of a sudden those pipes came un-strapped?" Two nights ago I was driving Northbound on I-95 from Petersburg and one of these trucks was in front of me and I found myself thinking that very question. I thought through different scenereos, one involved me slamming on the breaks and pulling onto the shoulder, hoping the pipes didn't bounce through my windshield. Another involved me turning as hard as I could into the shoulder and driving the opposite direction. This seemed like a bad plan. I nixed that from my scenereo.

Next came stopping dead in my tracks and ducking, in hopes that if a pipe did go through my windshield it would clear my head and I wouldn't be a goner. Pulling over to the shoulder and doing the same thing was another option. Would it make a difference if I turned my car sideways? If so, passenger side towards the oncoming, almost certain wreckage, or drivers side towards it? What are the odds that the pipes would just go right over my car? What would happen if it hit the nose of my car, or went under it and hit the undercarriage? Could one of those things flip my car over? AH! Just thinking these things caused me to slow down by about 5mph without realizing as I watched the monster truck getting farther away from me. I glanced down at my spedomiter and said to myself, "It's not really worth following an almost certain death if I can avoid the situation completely..." sped up and promptly made my way into the passing lane so I could pass by it.

Around this time I was to the World War II Veteran's Memorial Bridge, where there were of course... more trucks. Apparently I could not escape 18-wheelers on the road this evening. At least these didn't have pipe on them, just oversized box trucks. I inhaled, relaxed and enjoyed the bridges I was passing under and made the rest of the journey home.