Seems a few of us think this would be a fun idea. A thread simply to share our stories of driving in the snow.

Being in the deep south I don't have any new ones, but I've got a few from my time in Virginia.

I'll share one of the scariest for me, I was only a passenger, but probably about 5 years old, my father, mother, and myself were going to my grandparents house (I'm thinking it could have been Christmas too...) they literally live on a mountain in Independence, Va. There is a very steep hill going up to there house, that continues up the road, VERY STEEP, on the left side of the hill below their house in a near 150-200ft drop off into the forest and a creek, on the right side more trees. The hill is only wide enough in certain area's for two vehicles to pass each other...

The hill was ice covered, us in a old 4dr Lincoln Town car, which if ya'll can remember, those things are boats, probably as long as our trucks.

One of their neighbors came FLYING down in the hill in his Ford F150, he had so much speed when he passed us it made our car do a 180 with the front staring at the cliff with the drop off. Did he stop to help? Nope.

There wasn't enough room behind us to back up much and with the ice, traction was hard to get, I was so freaked I got out and walked up to my grandparent's house.

I've no clue how they got the car straightened out, but they did.

 

In Dec. 09 we had our first snow, and it was my first winter as a driver. I was at a friends house, when it had started snowing, and by the time I left it was sticking pretty good. Once I got into town, there was about an inch or two of snow on the road, and the DoT crews had not been out. As I made a turn I realized it was pretty easy to kick my truck sideways, and bring it back. Needless to say, only having my license for 2 months I thought I was cool, and I was stepping the rear end out until I got to my house.

The next day, the Plow trucks still had not ran. I decided I was going to go back out, and drive in the snow, the night before was pretty fun. Well I got about 2 and half miles out of town, after kicking my rear end out a couple times, I decided to head back, and drift, do donuts, and walk my truck sideways in my school's parking lot, nice open, fun, and always slick.

On my way back, finally I see a snow plow, but he was heading in the opposite direction towards me, and the snow was still powdery enough, that behind him was just a big snow cloud. As soon as he passed I could see nothing, when I came out on the other side I noticed I was off the road just a little bit, I brought it back on the road, but I was sideways, and not the little kick the rear end out sideways I thought was cool, I mean heading straight for the ditch sideways. It was like it was all on slow motion, the amount of thought that go through your mind in just that little amount of time is unreal. I remember going for the brake, then remembering something my brother had told me, about never hit the brakes on ice / snow or something like that, so instead I mashed the gas and turned to the right, it slung the rear end into the ditch, and it seemed like my front end was pointing straight up, wheel turned all the way to the left now, the throttle to the floor, both rear tires in the ditch, and I'm trying to bring it back on the road. Next thing I know, I shoot out of the ditch, but now I'm heading for the other one, again I mash the gas, over corrected probably 2 or 3 more times, then did a 180 in the middle of the road, I just sat there for about 20 seconds.

I drove back to the place I originally turned around at and checked for damage, luckily there was none, I never actually hit anything, I got back in, fired her back up, and I kept it under 20 mph the whole way home, and decided not to go up to the school.

 

I'd do stuff like that in my blazer. Early morning after it snowed I'd go out and get a "feel" for the snow, then I'd start playin

 

Driving home from work one fine evening in my Sirocco....... We had gotten about six inches while I was at work, on top of the three that were already on the ground...... The S handled snow really well, and the tires were almost new.. so, it really wasn't that much of an ordeal. I kept the speed at about 35 though...... (which made for an hour drive home......) Came up behind some guy in his 4x4...... doing 15mph....... and not handling it well..... I was a bit surprised... but, decided since there was no one else on the road, I would just go around him. Pulled out to pass, and noticed there was a bit of a 'bump' on the centerline, where snow had piled up.. Didn't worry about it overmuch, got around the truck, and attempted to pull back into my lane....... I almost made it... drivers rear tire hung up on the humped up snow, and simply would not come thru it, so, I was kinda dragging the car slightly sideways down the road. I pointed the front toward the shoulder a bit more, to pull the rear over the hump, and it worked... to well..... the rear end came over with a lurch, and I did two complete 360's about 10 feet off the front of the 4x4 I had just passed......... I was cranking the wheel from side to side like a mad man attempting to stop the rotation, and get the car pointed in the right direction again..... and amazingly enough, managed it....... I was still doing about 30, about 15 feet in front of the truck now...... and the car was once again under control.

My buddy in the passenger seat turned and looked at me, and said: "That was pretty good. I'm impressed. Don't do it again. I need to clean out my pants. Let's go home." I think it was about ten minutes before he could actually pry his hand off the Oh My God bar.

The rest of the trip was uneventful.

 

Last winter i was driving over an i20 overpass in big red, doing maybe 10. I gues the wind gusted pretty bad and slamed my truck sideways into the guard rails hard enough to let me see the interstate directly below me. When i got where i was going i looked for damage, but i got lucky. The guard rail wasnt as tall as my tires so i never hit the body, only the rims(and they wernt bent thank jesus). I hate driving on ice

 

Here in montana snow and ice is nothing special. Although I do have one story... I was in town and we got paged out to an MVA on the hwy. I responded and was running 75-80(code 3) down the hwy. Road was wet but not icy..yet. I About 5min in to my response i looked at the temp and it was 32 degrees. road was still wet at this point so i kept on running at about 60. As i started down a hill and around a corner my truck went sideways with the ambulance behind me and oncoming cars ahead. Some how i was able to get it straight. radio'ed a few other responders and found out that one of them found the same spot i did. (after that spot it was actually solid ice all the way too the wreck). Also was on a call one time, i pulled up in the engine on a icy hill, and stopped(set the air brakes and whatnot). Got out and as i was walking back to the rear of the truck it started sliding... down the hill. Luckly it didn't go to far lol.

 

We heard on the news one morning that we were looking at three or four days of heavy snowfall, strong wind, and lots of icing, so the old lady and I figured it was a good time to get our grocery shopping done ahead of the storm. Off toward town we went. On a nice long straight stretch of road that passes near a small lake we encountered ground blizzards with the wind coming from over the lake, so I tried the brakes and found that we had good traction and nothing to worry about.

There was construction on the lake shore, yuppie starter mansions going in, and a bit over a quarter mile ahead of us was a carpet layer special -- and old white Chebbie van, with rolls of carpet and pad hanging out the back, doors tied tight against the rolls. Turn signal on, then brake lights, it was obvious he wanted to turn into the new scumdivision. I gently applied the brakes to knock some speed off despite the fact that at our sedate 30MPH the carpet layer would be turned onto the side road and out of the way long before we got there. I didn't get much speed burned off -- maybe 20 feet along we got onto solid ice. No worries; I just started gently pumping the brakes, waiting for that light floating feeling to go away when we found some traction.

Then the van went past the turn, and stopped dead in the traffic lane just beyond it. I took that to mean that he'd found dry pavement, so I opened up my cute air horns, and started gently nudging the steering wheel left and right while gently pumping the brakes so that if we found traction I might find a ditch rather than the back of the van. I had in mind to switch from the brake to the gas if I could just get the nose pointed off center, and hope to propel the Jeep off the side of the road where I could find traction and get control of the situation.

There was no traction to be had. And the van driver? He whirled around in his seat to watch the wreck while his passenger yelled and waved his arms frantically, screaming at the guy to get his nasty old van over to the shoulder of the road.

At our low speed it was ten seconds or so to close the gap, with the idiot in the van sitting there wide eyed and slack jawed watching it happen. I got to watch the van doors crush my grille and buckle my hood in slow motion, then the steam spewing out as the radiator met the fan, and finally everything coming to a stop. That was when the van driver figured it was a good time to move his van. He turned around on the road and went back to his turn, then parked and got out. I moved the Cherokee well off the side of the road so the next guy to come along might not hit it. It seemed the sensible thing to do.

I walked up to the idiot, necessary documentation in hand, and he started babbling. "Oh, man, I'm so sorry. I've never driven in snow before. I'm from California, just got here two days ago. Came here to work. I'm a carpet layer. I just freaked out. I should have gotten out of the way. My buddy was yelling at me to get out of the way. I've never driven in snow before. I was just too freaked out. I'm so sorry..." blah blah blah. It seemed like ten minutes waiting for him to wind down enough to exchange information.

360,000+ adventurous miles of my own on my '78 Cherokee (with 412,000 on the clock) and it was killed by a moron. Damn.

 

Unreg, Morons are good for that, no? grrrrrrrrr.....

I lived on a mountain in Tennessee growing up.. Snow wasn't all that common, but it happened.. we lived so far out we had to have sunshine pumped out to us.. that joint still doesn't have cable tv to this day..

the road S'd this way and that up the side of pretty steep hill.. the final turn, nearing the top, was the steepest..

This story wasn't about me driving, it was about some clown out playing in the snow in his short wheel based bronco.. I was walking up the hill, and was about to clear the top when I heard this idiot coming from the other side.. I stepped across the ditch, and figured he'd dang near hafta be aiming for me if he were to hit me..

He cleared the top, and all I could see was the white grill, orange hood, and white cab- and the look of amusement on the drivers face through the wind shield.. Everything else, such as tires and trailing winds were camo'd in white clouds of powder..

I reckon he finally realized he was heading downhill, and he jammed the breaks... He started sliding.. this is the part that prompted me to share: I clearly heard gears grinding, and all of the sudden the Bronco kinda leaping backwards, only to continue sliding forward.. he was in floggin reverse.. all four tires spun the opposite direction he was rolling..

he looked back over his shoulder at me, and I noticed he wasn't so amused anymore- but he wasn't freaked either.. he almost looked like he would if he were saying 'good-bye' as he was leaving a store, a family cook-out or something.. He shot me that look while all four tires were still digging in reverse, and he still slid forward- and continued the stare until right before he went over the edge.. It was comical..

He made a new road.. or, let's call it a trail.. I recall watching the taillights tip over to where they were flashing the sky and thinking "Dude, you are SOOOOO effed".. And, I waited for the crash.. waited.. waited.. sounding like a bush hog, but no crash..

I'll be absolutely damned if he didn't drive that floggin bronco straight down that incline of around 60* or so.. How he chose that 'line', if in fact he did any choosing at all, is beyond me.. He lost his rear view mirrors to trees, and went straight over a couple saplings, but he didn't hit anything that would have caused him to, uh, stop abruptly.. there was a little drop near the end of about 3 foot or so.. apparently, he had enough momentum to clear that without getting hung up and going **** over nose..

I ran to the scene, and looked down in time to see some of the vegetation rebounding, and waited to hear a voice, a car door shut- something.. I was thinking "man, it will take an hour or more for rescue to show up".. Then I heard him fire the engine back up..

There was a cove off lake at the foot of the hill, and the road kinda hugged it.. Once I moved positions, I could see him driving away, and listened to something metal slapping the hell out of something else metal- but never saw him again.. I have no clue how that dude made it out of that situation in a condition where he could actually drive- at the very least, I would have had to stop and empty my drawers.. go figure, right?

Several years later, the lake froze.. which was uncommon.. the ice was likely a foot thick.. some fellers were out driving their jeeps on it.. One of them took the splash in water likely 20~30' deep.. I was told it was a jeep, and it seemed all the kids at school knew somebody who knew somebody who was there- so stories varied- in my mind, the driver of that jeep and the driver of that Bronco were one and the same.. Or, at least I hope they were.. It's too distasteful to consider that there are in fact TWO idiots out there..

 

Not a snow story... but........

Was off to visit a friend, and taking one of my favorite roads... has some nice corners on it..... and I was driving a car that LIKED corners. (wasn't mine....) Coming into the first of series of S turns, had my line all set up, speed correct, no traffic for miles, doing about 80......... when the 'road noise' suddenly changed....... Seems the DOT, in their infinite wisdom, had come thru and done the tar and gravel thing recently, so there was two inches of loose gravel on the road....... I quickly realized there was NO way in HELL I was going to be able to maintain my line thru the really cool 90* sweeper that was only seconds away at my current speed...... So, I picked the 'best' escape route I had time to get set for....... between two trees, into a stand of small (2 inch) saplings. OVER a small creek, into open field...... It would have been fine, had I had just a bit more speed...... I didn't clear the creek, and SLAMMED nose-first into the far bank, the car then proceeded to flip over length-wise, and ended up on the roof....... EVERY window in the car blew out as the car got about 8 inches shorter....... I then slid the remaining distance into the field.....

After extricating myself from what used to be a nice car..... I walked to the nearest farmhouse, called my friend that actually owned the car first.... and then the local constabulary, and suggested they bring some pretty hefty recovery gear.... I was a good distance from the road...... My friend wasn't too pissed..... he had planned to sell the car anyway, and had full-coverage.... The cops didn't write me a ticket, as there were NO signs indicating that DOT had made the corners significantly more hazardous..... I had a few new scars for the experience, and a stiff neck for a few days though....

 

More proficient than good, I think.

Dude, we're surrounded. Wear your seat belt and keep your eyes open! Don't sit too close to the air bag.

I don't know how it's going to be this winter, having been gone for four years, but in the winter of 2006/2007 we had entirely too many flatlanders up here, oil field trash from the sun belt lured here by the oil shale extraction work. Most of them have returned to their native haunts, so it might be safer now... time will tell. Before we left, there weren't too many wintry days when there weren't any crashes, and when things really did get treacherous there weren't enough wreckers in town to clean up the messes in a timely manner. It got to where I was afraid to leave town, or to even be out and about in town when they were commuting.

One of those clowns actually told me, after totaling his truck in a single car crash, that he held the state accountable for having posted the speed limit at 65 when it wasn't safe to drive that fast. And that he was planning to sue for damages.

PS: I got sidetracked! The whole reason I poked the Quote button was to remark that yours is a helluva good story. I've got relatives that do that kind of crap and get away with it -- it's safer to ride with them than to be anywhere near the highway when they're out. My solution is just to live far away from the lot of 'em.