We were driving up to ski. The driver is a guy who’s lived here and been going to and from Mount Bachelor as long as I have over three decades. It’s snowing hard and we’re cruising along, in control, at 45 mph.
That’s when the first car blazes past at what’s gotta be 65mph. Then comes another one and another including one driver who thinks it’s safe to pass on a blind corner.
Which brings up the question: why the hurry? The ski area isn’t going to disappear, the lifts should be running all day, the snow looks like it’ll provide plenty of fresh, untracked cover to ski for the next several hours. So why the zeal to get there so quickly?
It’s always been thus and probably will not change until there’s a major accident. But who knows if even that will change some drivers’ need to go as fast as they can, pass recklessly and generally imperil a lot of people. And the bet part is the worse the conditions, the worse the driving.
Take a couple of years ago when I was crawling down the roadway because it was as slick as I’d ever seen it. Cars were already snugged up against the snow bank at the road’s edge after sliding ever so slowly into it.
At the first big bend in the road just after the Virginia Meissner snopark, an SUV came roaring up behind me and started flashing its light for me to either go faster or get the hell out of the way. I chose the latter.
The SUV hurtled by and made it about 250 yards before going into a huge slide, crashed through the snow bank and then proceeded to roll over three times on it’s way to landing some forty feet off the roadway.
Thankfully nobody was hurt and more than likely no lesson was learned.
“Unfortunately,” a retired OHP trooper told me last year, “everyone thinks if they have four-wheel drive they are bulletproof and can drive as fast as they want on snow and ice.”
Driving cautiously on the way to and from the mountain is a rule for some, four-wheel drive or not, but for most it’s something to scoff at.
This article appears in Dec 2-8, 2010.
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“And the bet part is.” Typo! AHHHH! 🙂
Good article, completely agree with this.
…. and it will continue until the end of time. While we have tourists we will have speeders in the snow, locals, I believe, run a close second.
More police patrols maybe? Best have them up there early, we all look at our speed, hope our headlights are still working and have a better look around when we see a patrol car. The Deputies would rather be there doing traffic patrols rather than them be called to clean up after an accident. I hope there is never a time that an accident up there takes a life.
“Unfortunately,” a retired OHP trooper told me last year, “everyone thinks if they have four-wheel drive they are bulletproof and can drive as fast as they want on snow and ice.”
Well, there you have it.
Having studded tires reinforces this delusion.
Totally agree, Bob! What’s the big hurray? I’d rather get up there in one piece 10 minutes later and enjoy a good day of skiing and then return home safely to enjoy another day in the near future. 4-wheel “go” doesn’t mean 4-wheel “stop!”
It’s a hellva lot easier to speed up than it is to slow down;-)
Do the math. Mt. Bachelor is about 20 miles from Bend (I use round numbers to make it easy. I went to public school.). At 40 miles an hour it takes you 30 minutes to get there. If you travel at 60 miles per hour you get there in 20 minutes. Is that risk really worth the extra ten minutes of powder skiing? Just a thought, leave the house ten minutes earlier. HMMM!
For most of the speeders, I bet it’s not about getting to the mountain a little sooner — it’s about the thrill of speeding. Skiing (downhill) and snowboarding are sports for people who enjoy speed (me included) so it’s natural that many (not all) skiers and snowboarders would enjoy driving fast.
You won’t enjoy driving fast when it is your best friend, brother, mother, or child, that is killed by a speeding driver! Been there… it is not worth it!
The whole driving issue is multi-sided.
I see nothing wrong with passing in the areas that were marked as safe for passing and using your experience to determine when road conditions are safe. True if you drive to the mountain twice a year then you probably don’t know the areas and conditions that would be safe to pass in. Totally correct that blind corners and bad road conditions are not times to pass, but just because there is snow on the side of the road is not a reason to drive 30 MPH.
Also as far as passing goes, the safe places to pass are the open straightaways. Now we all know that the standard driving operations are go very slow through anything that looks like it might have a remote chance of being slick and then go like hell in straight aways to get to the curves so you can go slow again. Example here is slow car, 30 MPH, up to the Wanoga straight away then 60 MPH up to the curves past Wanoga and then back to 30 MPH. for the rest of the drive, with a hard pack snow surface at 15 degrees air temp all the way. Sorry this is not a dangerous road condition but having to follow these people is.
In the same note under safety what is the deal of driving 10 feet behind the car in front at 45 MPH? There are times when I definitely do not feel safe trapped in a caterpillar of cars crawling up the hill with the guy behind me 10 feet of my a%$. Under these conditions I feel a lot like a lemming in line for the cliff, safer to get out of the pack so there is a little room for manuevering.
I drive a two wheel drive with studded tires, and have a lot of confidence in what my car can and can’t do. After I put it in the ditch you can berate me, although most of what I see in the ditch is 4×4. Remember if you really want to be safe take the Bachelor bus or stay home, under the bed. No matter how you drive, driving is dangerous and accidents will happen. Enough ranting, drive politely and safely to your limits.
I agree with the article entirely. However… OHP?? Last time I checked, it was the Oregon State Police, and the CHP were harassing our dear friends to the south… (many which now live in Bend…)
Life: “Speeding” is driving too fast for conditions, the road, the vehicle or your own skills. I don’t do that.