My Kangaroo near miss

[spaz]

I keep my eye's peeled pretty much the whole 5hr drive, I pull over If something falls on the floor and I need it etc. I prefer to drive at night with less traffic and can nudge the speed up a little - my car is at performance spec now.

I've avoided heaps of animals, only one non-flying, bigger than a rabbit, animal has ever been injured/killed while I'm driving.

Sure a lot has to do with luck, especially this time:
It's Wednesday, an hour after dark, heading south into Lake George. I had cleared my ipod in place of PP's party music and hadn't listened to any music (excluding my engine) for a while. Tried to find tripleJ on the radio but forget the channel, so out comes the iphone/safari/google, eyes back on the road...... WHOA! There it is at 5m away (not far at 80mph), landing on the lane divider coming into my path (crouched over it was above my bonnet), my heart hadn't yet reached it's next beat, nor had the thought of the damage my second child would undertake, and the roo ducked into a turn to avoid me by inches. I've never seen a roo do that! I must have blinked or prepared myself for the impact - the roo vanished.

I avoided 3 more on on the Alpine Way and maybe a half dozen wombats to swerve around also.

[Podlettte]

Good that you missed it, not sure what intervened to make that happen.

Those that know say fiddling with anything while driving is the same as driving drunk, your reactions are similarly impaired. Sorry if this offends but googling a radio station while driving at night or anytime is just asking for an accident.

[chunky]

I've had one near miss outside Warwick. They can blend in on the side of the road so well and at the speed you're travelling you hope they won't make a dash for the bitumen. That said over the last few years they have widened the vacant zone on either side of the road outside Warwick similiar to what they do on the Newell through the Pilliga.

[SnoWhite]

Sounds like a close call Spaz. The roos are one of the things that discourage me driving at night around here unless I absolutely have to! Not to mention the deer and wombats. I'm still on the lookout on the freeways when going to and from Sydney. Doesn't take much to distract you and it only takes a split second for something like that to happen. :eek:

[spaz]

For sure Pods, I've set my car up so everything is in reach without having to stretch or look where it is first. And while I agree and will prob never do it again, Googling took less attention than tuning the radio, the phone sits on the dash in a cradle and keeps my eye level on the road. It was in trying to read where on the J site the info I wanted was.

Split second indeed. I know the wildlife is there and take the attitude that they are waiting to jump out to try to get me.

My thought is that my new engine scares the hell out of em, they now have very different looks on their faces, even the wombats give me recognition. It's a freaken loud engine at full roar, Jax heard me from over the mountain for 10 min before I saw her at DHG.

[SnowFlake]

Yes I do my fair share of driving in the rural areas at night and on those roads I frequent have spec'd the wildlife corridors. Even through the green belts in Canberra there are notorious kangaroo alleys like Majura Rd (traveling toward the airport for those of you driving from Sydney to the ski fields).

Have long range auxillary driving lights but as luck would have it the nearest misses are when traffic is approaching and I am on low beam.

Even travelling on back roads at no more than 50km per hour I have had roos jump into the side of the car and on a recent occassion there it was off an embankment clear over the car!! Sometimes it just comes down to pure chance.

[spaz]

A friend had one go through the passenger window (when it was closed) while crawling through Pats Patch.

[Polaris]

Originally posted by spaz:
A friend had one go through the passenger window (when it was closed) while crawling through Pats Patch. Hhhmmmmm, Pat's Patch, could be a variety of "animals" going through the passenger window out there ;)

[spaz]

graemlins/big_laugh.gif
...or a hallucination, except for the shattered glass and fur.

I lived there for 6 weeks but only a few days can be recollected.
graemlins/cold.gif

[Polaris]

Originally posted by spaz:

I lived there for 6 weeks but only a few days can be recollected.
graemlins/cold.gif Good to see somethings never change ;)

[SnoWhite]

Well, just goes to show you can never be too careful in this town.

Driving to work this morning, took a left at the big roundabout to head up the hill towards the industrial estate and just before the cemetary I had to hit the brakes to miss a couple of roos jumping down the street!