125 car Pile-up Kills 10 in Georgia

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[Bryan24]

Interstate in Georgia gets fogged in. 125 autos involved.

[billbears]

The latest North American Car Show had very few SUVs that I saw and more vehicles like a SUV/station wagon mix thing. It was a little strange looking. They were lower to the ground than the SUVs. Personally, I don't care for them, but I'm not too keen on some of these 4 cylinder cars. I've ridden in a couple of them and felt like if anything hit the car, it was going to crumple. I know they're good for gas mileage, but a lot of those drivers are quite dangerous on the road. They pull out in front of other cars and don't have the pickup to get to a good speed causing accidents that way

[Tazlo]

A lot of the northbound traffic coming up from Calhoun today had Michigan and Ontario plates and most of them were grey-haired.

Sure hope those folks could handle the fog.

[crystalk]

And so convenient to a certain crematory whose business was starting to fall off after a recent public relations problem...

[monday]

"I noticed that the vehicles in the ditches and medians were the 4X4 kind. Maybe the enviros are right. We need to get these things off the roads."

Safty Nazi. Maybe you should wrap yourself in cotton and hide in the closet. You will be very safe there!

[monday]

"When will insurance companies take notice and charge them insurance rates commensurate to the danger they pose to others, themselves and their passengers."

They already do. Fact is SUV's are safer then other cars on the road, despite what you read in the liberal press. You shouldn't buy into the propaganda, makes you look silly.

[monday]

"A lot of people really like the word "ban." I think such people are not worth spitting on."

You and me both!

[Wright is right!]

"BTW..just some trivia for you..."Ringgold", GA is famous for it's little "Marriage Chapel"...(gold ring, "Ringgold"). That's where Dolly Parton (I believe it was her) got married. ;-)"

Ringgold didn't gain its fame for Parton's nuptuals there - but rather for its extremely lenient policy of allowing very very very young couples to wed with a minimum of such ugly details as "parental consent" and red tape. Lots of then-mid-teens got married in Ringgold, and it didn't matter what state you lived in. Instant license, hit the chapel, pay the parson, and you're off to the races. If you got married in Ringgold, it was usually because you were too young to get married anywhere else.

Uniform state laws changed all that, of course, but GA still has the lowest age-of-consent laws if I'm not mistaken.

Michael

[glc1173@aol.com]

It was extremely foggy around midnight here in Burlington, North Carolina.

Cleared up - somewhat - by 4:00 A.M.

[GingisK]

otherwise I would be on "America's Most Wanted List"!

... or maybe that would be me on the list ...

;-D

[DJ88]

Oh..well, see? My ex (stress "ex") fiancee told me that story. ;-) Glad I didn't marry him. *grins*

[DJ88]

I am a WOMAN who drives an SUV and I can tell you that I may be in a minority, but I don't have a cell phone, use both hands on the steering wheel most of the time, my kids are buckled up, I am buckled up and usually, I have to veer out of the way of some jerk on his cellphone flying down the road in his BMW.

So there. :-)

[Brookhaven]

But the real scary part is us sitting in our Accords can't see in front of them, and are totally dependent upon their ability to see and stop, or avoid, or to create an accident that we can't ditch away from.

Instead of trying to estimate car lengths, my high school dirver's ed teacher had a simple rule for detrmining how much of a gap you should leave between yourself and the car in front of you. If the car in front of you suddenly slammed on their brakes, if you can't stop before you hit them, then you are following too close.

Following any closer means you are (literaly) putting YOUR life into the hands of a STRANGER. To me anyway, that's unacceptable.

[OrioleFan]

Another example of natural selection.

[Brookhaven]

The latest North American Car Show had very few SUVs that I saw and more vehicles like a SUV/station wagon mix thing.

I was talking to a guy who owns a Ford dealership several years ago, and he said Ford had changed its design philosophy and was designing their cars to appeal to women. He said their research showed that women were making more of the buying decisions for families.

He pointed out that the layouts of the dash and interior were designed to appeal to women. Also, women tended to like the functionality of trucks, but dislike vehicles that ride and look like trucks. Ford had just introduced the Windstar, which he said was the way Ford was going with its designs. Lots of room like a truck, but sits lower to the ground, and drives and feels more like a car than a truck.

The trick is to create a vehicle like this without having it called a station wagon, which is the kiss of death to sales. Women want the functionality and ride of a station wagon, but the association with the '50s suburban housewife stereotype make women reject them.

[Middle Man]

Whenever I see a guy behind the wheel of an SUV, it's usually with the wife and kids on a weekend family outing.

Don't get me started on Beamers. That's a whole 'nother thread altogether. ;)

[Brookhaven]

After the last couple of snow/ice storms, I noticed that the vehicles in the ditches and medians were the 4X4 kind. Maybe the enviros are right. We need to get these things off the roads.

The enviros, as usual, have it wrong. What we need to do is teach people how to drive. In GA, you take your driving test in a parking lot. You never even get onto the road. No type of driver training is required.

There will always be big cars on the road. Even if you outlaw SUVs, you still have vans, pickups, and commercial vehicles to deal with. Everyone needs to learn how to drive safely. How many times have you seen a sedan change lanes and jump right in front of an 18-wheeler? There are just as many careless people driving small cars as their are driving big ones. The key to safety is teaching people how to drive.

[js1138]

I've driven that stretch a zillion times. There's a spot on I75 about 50 miles north, in Tennessee, where the worst pileup in history occurred. I've seen it so bad you couldn't see the outside of your own windshield.

<];^)

[billbears]

You drive your SUV, personally I want to drive the BROWN TRUCK!!

[aShepard]

If the car in front of you suddenly slammed on their brakes, if you can't stop before you hit them, then you are following too close

Yeah, but that's become an urban legend.

If you leave that much room in front of you, two (that's 2) cars will change lanes and sneak in ahead of you going 70 miles an hour. So you curse and fall back a bit, and another one comes in.

I commute 50 miles each way in Boston area traffic, it's a b*tch!

[DJ88]

ROFLOL!!!! ;-) Me too...:-( IF I could have gotten a nice color of brown, I would be driving a BIG BROWN TRUCK! ;-)