Near Miss of the Day 481: A very scary close encounter with 'Farmer Giles' (includes swearing)

It's the same where I live too and it's because they are paid per load, this promotes a 'must get the next load at all costs' attitude, which isn't conducive to considerate driving.

Has anyone reported the road to the council?

Looks a bit narrow to me. That tractor was further over than I would have expected, but I guess that's to give enough room to get their trailer through. Hazard lights would definitely be a good call.

And if you flip it round, why did the tractor driver think it was ok to go through a narrow section where they could not see oncoming traffic? Add to that they took up nearly the whole road under the bridge.

Presumably, the way ahead was clear when they started going through the tunnel and unfortunately there's very poor visibility around it so there was no way they could determine if they'd encounter traffic after they'd started through it. If they'd had a nice flashing warning light on top then that would've been a good heads-up for the cyclist, but in this case I think the cyclist should have been more careful on the approach. I guess the tractor could have been closer to their side but they didn't look to have much room to spare with that trailer behind them.

The other thing that could have been done is to sound the horn, although I have never heard anyone do this (have rarely done it myself). If you do go narrowboating, it is something you would do a bit more often, given the size of the boat and unsighted bends.

hirsute wrote:

The other thing that could have been done is to sound the horn, although I have never heard anyone do this (have rarely done it myself). If you do go narrowboating, it is something you would do a bit more often, given the size of the boat and unsighted bends.

I'd be more than worried if I met a narrowboat on a road like that.

Bloody tractors, taking up the whole road. 

Have you been to the country? Loads of minor roads/ lanes that are used by agricultural vehicles are not even wide enough for two cars to pass without using passing places or pulling right up onto the verge.

"should have had an escort" 

I must be imagining those wide loads I see everyother month on the local roads with an escort.

In this instance, there were 4 tractors, not one.

I've seen combine harvesters with "wide load" signs and escorts. Standard tractors, not so much.

It was more that there were 3 in a convoy (doubled checked and the other vehicle I saw was a car), which I think tips the balance a bit.

If the first tractor did have headlights and the orange/yellow strobe on, that would have probably made a big difference to the oncoming cyclist's approach.

youll get escorts with combines, as they can take up the whole road even without the cutting bit attached on the front, but not tractors like that, and thats a standard tractor size thesedays, they havent blinged up and got a super grande version.

its the noise of the tyres on the road that I think always make tractor encounters more shocking when you experience them, than perhaps they would be with other vehicles in similar positions. I mean it could easily have been an hgv manouvering slowly through without an escort either, and I dont think you could have had any complaints as a rider in that setup, so why is the tractor different ?

tractors on country roads, you are never quite prepared for them,but I at least kind of accept its a recognised hazard of riding around rural roads, just as theres a ton of mud currently on those roads, the trucks taking away the stuff dug up from the fields Ive less time for as they seem to be driven by frustrated taxi or delivery van drivers.

The hgv would have take the low bridge out...

As above, it was the number of tractors involved, one would have been ok. You could envisage a situation with another large vehicle where none of the 4 vehicles could easily move.

CXR94Di2 wrote:

This is not anticipating the obvious, vehicles coming the other way at a dark obscured pinch point.   Slow down when you cant see what's around the corner. 

Only travel as fast in what you can stop in or expect to encounter what you did 

agreed - driving a car under that bridge at 27mph (failing to heed the 'slow' caution painted on the road) without seeing the road was clear would be reckless driving IMO

Not only that, he consciously accelerated from 23mph to 27mph just as he approached the obviously pitch black tunnel.

I do agree the corner should be approached with more caution, but that also goes for the tractor - the video also shows that while traveling on the wrong side of the road, round a blind corner, the tractor had no intention of stopping despite a high probability of causing death or injury to anything oncoming - which seems to be a problem with anyone behind the wheel of a big vehicle - this assumption the others will compensate to not get hurt.

As has been pointed out if a tractor with the same mindset was coming the otherway it would of been a colision. Actually the only reason there wasn't a collision here is because Jon was on a bike, anything wider being used in a similar way to either the tractor or the bike would have been a collision.

Unless we can determine the speed of the tractor I don't beleive either is a valid conclusion.  The rider himself has indicated that he didn't hold the driver responsible.

This is one of those gods given situations that allow us to say (when we've stopped swearing) "that was close, learned something there" without any harm done. We've all been there.....