From time to time, a random chance works out in your favor -- especially if you nudge the odds in the right direction. The last winter we lived in Allentown, it snowed a lot. Like 65 inches. It soon got to be too much trouble to clear all the snow off the top of our Dodge van, seemingly every time we wanted to go out. And so it happened that when temperatures climbed above freezing in the spring, there was still an inch-thick layer of ice on top of the van.
I knew I had this load of ice on the roof as I got onto US 22. My idea was that sometime before I got up to speed, the wind would lift the ice off the roof and let it smash harmlessly in the roadway. All I had to do was time my acceleration so that noone was following too closely behind. I drove with a good bit of my attention directed toward the rear-view mirror.
It was also the case that -- even though the I-78 bypass had recently opened -- most of the truck traffic still went through on US 22. And they drove as if they owned all 4 lanes. Passenger cars were not welcome. (I'll bet you can guess where this story is going.) Well, the ice proved more tenacious than I had anticipated. And in the mean time, one of those obnoxious trucks came up behind and completely filled the rear-view. I was already doing 60, and there he was -- not 16 feet off my rear bumper. He was, in fact, driving in my slipstream -- as proven by what happened next. I had switched from thinking "I hope it doesn't go now." to "Oh please oh please oh please!"
The little bump going onto the deck of the Lehigh River bridge and a little gust together were enough to tilt the leading edge of the ice sheet up, and away it went! I watched it start to fall toward the pavement, but then the slipstream carried it up and let it smash right across the hood of the truck. Score! Well what do you think? A minute later he was back on my tail blowing the horn like crazy. OK, fine. I'd be upset too. I slowed down a bit, but he continued following for at least five miles. Somewhere in there it became apparent he wanted me to pull over. But there was nothing I could do because the shoulder was all filled with snow. When I did finally pull over, the trucker came up and wanted my insurance information. He said that the ice from my car had cracked his windshield and wanted my insurance to cover the damage. OK, fine. We exchanged insurance and contact information. He wasn't angry like I expected him to be. He was also apparently clueless that his tailgating played a major part in getting his windshield smashed. Maybe he got a clue later.
When I returned home, I received a call from my insuror, wanting to know the circumstances of the claim. I stressed that the trucker had been following me so closely. Otherwise, the ice from my roof would have fallen harmlessly to the ground. An hour later, the trucking company called and I gave them the same story. My guess is that the claims adjustor for my insurance called the trucking company and at least gave them a hard time before paying up. I can only hope that the trucking company gave their trucker the same treatment.
