Public Service Announcement

[Mytdawg]

Please don't let your dog hang out of the vehicle window at highway speeds...

I was following a Cavalier onto the highway on Tuesday and the dog had it's front feet on the driver's side door window opening from the back seat.  And most people know that they can get hit by flying debris, get injured or even lose an eye but occasionally I see one hanging out.  Or even worse, riding in the back of a truck unrestrained.

Guy in 2 door Cavalier gets on highway, with me behind him fixated on the dog grumpily thinking "that's such a bad idea".  Proceeds to pull into left lane to pass slower traffic.  Doesn't do a real good mirror check because, well there's a dog in the way apparently.

I see the oncoming truck and it's like a bad movie.  Pickup is moving at very high rate of speed.  Cavalier doesn't see truck and gets in path.  I'm watching the dog going "no no no no".  Truck never sees Cavalier even though he has at least 20-30 seconds to brake, swerve, respond - do something.  Never saw a brake light.  He just plowed into the back of the Cavalier going at least 30 mph faster than the car.

Blew all the glass out of the car and blew the dog into the median like a rag doll then shoved the car another 100 feet into the median, bounced around, stopped and looked and then kept going.  I was mortified.  I was so upset they kept asking me if I was a participant in the accident.

Mercifully the dog survived.  And they nailed the truck driver a couple exits down.  And I still don't think it's a good idea to let them hang out the window at highway speeds.   N:(

[Stripe]

Wow.....

[legomybago]

This last weekend when we were at the coast, a pickup truck veared over the yellow line on Hwy 101 and head on into a large class A rig from Alaska, maybe 36 footer. The driver in the pickup was dead on impact, and the couple touring from Alaska were ok. There was no front axle or basement storage down the driver side on the motorhome.......You could only recognize the pickup truck because it still had a bed on the back....Absolute destruction on both rigs....very scary. Eye opener for sure.

[Alaskan Itasca]

A couple months ago we saw a dog hanging out a window on the right side, the car went fast around a left hand corner and the dog rolled right out the window. It looked like a broken front leg on the dog at a minimum.