Madness on the A2

Yesterday I had to drive along the A2 a number of times both when it was raining and when it wasn't.  Frankly I was horrified by some of the driving that I saw and, believe me, I've seen plenty of examples over the years.

It started with seeing a car sliding down the opposite carriageway, sideways, in the very heavy rain, finally coming to a halt, straddling the two outside lanes.  I have no idea why they skidded but fortunately there wasn't anyone particularly close to them even though the traffic was very heavy.  Perhaps they had worn tyres, perhaps they did something a bit too sharpish.  Either way, they were obviously going far too fast for the conditions and were very lucky that they didn't hit anything although I suspect that the subsequent traffic jam probably saw a fair few accidents.

Later on in the day I was on the same stretch of the A2 and was being held up by someone doing 40mph.  It wasn't a lorry, van or clapped out car.  It was a woman in her thirties, hunched over the steering wheel, just pootling along.  It wasn't raining, the road surface was only mildly damp but she simply wouldn't go any faster.  What she probably fails to understand is that she is causing a serious hazard to other road users on that stretch of road.  If she's not comfortable on such roads, then find another route or take lessons to get confident!

Finally, and this is a bit of an issue for me, we have a tailgater!  A young woman in her KA completely oblivious of everything around her, about 15 feet from my rear bumper.  I got out of the way and she promptly drove right up behind the car in front and did the same to him.  At 60 miles per hour, thinking distance is 60 feet.  She is a quarter of that distance from the car in front.  If they sneeze, she is in the boot.  Why, oh why do people do it?  And she just seemed completely unaware that she was doing anything wrong.  She was obviously in a hurry - to die?

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