This used to be a topic in hybrid vehicle discussion, because air resistance is much reduced by close following on the highway. However, I think we reached consensus that risks outweigh benefits. A load of fireworks managed to self ignite: Semi trailer hauling fireworks explodes - KXLY Which leads me to suggest that if you are in minority that chooses to get close, familiarize yourself with these signs: Hazard Class Labels
Blown tires can be very 'unsettling' and are not uncommon. do not know what the worst hazard really is. Probably not that truck will explode in front of you. Way back I was on some highway in wee hours with CB radio. I chatted up a driver who had class 8 corrosives label. He said he was hauling hydrobromic acid. I got very far away
Commendable message. Still, reading the title, I was thinking of the times I've had truck headlights warming the back of my neck. Late at night, heavy downpour, that's the worst time.
No doubt many here have been closely followed by 20 to 40 tons of whatever. Another ye olde Prius topic, inflamed by adhering to posted speed limits.
In addition to tires and dangerous cargo, you also have to contend with FOD. You don't have to be a Concorde driver to appreciate how much damage that debris can cause. A tailgater has a much greater damage risk from things that the truck driver may or may not swerve to avoid in the road. I saw a tailgater get taken out by a cinder-block that a truck cleared easily but that a Pontiac Fiero driver had zero time to maneuver to avoid. As I passed the 18-wheeler, he was laughing uproariously at the former tailgater.... Karma? Not my call, but I can report that the incident did not result in a hull-loss incident or injury, so I was able to join in the truck driver's mirth "guilt-free." Tailgaters? Self punishing, IMHO.
I seem to recall posting here personal experience following a truck too closely at night. It launched a 'tire snake' that I saw flying over me in brave little Tochatihu. One can save a few $$ fuel cost by following closely. But it is not an excellent life strategy. I am so damn lucky. YOU are so damn lucky. Don't y'all meditate on that?
One of my worst was coming around a bend of a two lane highway in Ontario, on a bike, to meet a pair of semi-trailer trucks side by side, some sorta passing competition. The shoulder was gravel, so I went for the little strip of clear asphalt on the right extreme. The guy on my side was a flatbed, and I could see the hold-down hooks flashing by. Nobody stopped: all parties just kept going. After, my legs started shaking convulsively.
With a Cd of 0.26 why the hell would I be trying to be sucked along in a haze of diesel fumes and other debris which might be spewing from a Class 8, badly maintained juggernaut? Sheeesh!
Using dynamic cruise control, I follow high-balling trucks but even the closest setting still has enough time and distance to avoid road debris. When I used to drive a 1966 VW MicroBus, following close reaches a point of initial turbulence. The Prius Prime never gets to that point. On my trip from Rhode Island, I was following a truck and started smelling 'burning brake shoe.' Sure enough, about 10-20 miles down the road, sparks and flames. So I changed lanes as his rig pulled off to the side. Bob Wilson
i have seen too much debris come off trucks to take the risk. the reward ain't worth it. and my reaction times aren't improving.
A few years ago I was almost taken out by a couple rocks falling off a passing flatbed truck, bouncing over into my lane. Both were about the size of large baker potatoes. I pulled away enough to not take the closest one through the windshield, but it (or possibly another that I didn't see) struck the outside mirror mount, and exploded the front triangle window of my Forester. Glass fragments went everywhere, landed in every vent and pocket and cubby throughout the entire car, scratched the spouse's glasses and a cornea, and embedded in the back of my left hand (on steering wheel next to window). I'm just glad it happened in daylight. At night, I likely wouldn't have seen the rocks bouncing up from the pavement, and wouldn't have steered away. So the nearest one would probably have struck the windshield right in front of my face, and kept going through. I didn't have a dashcam then to identify the truck. Now I do.
that's why i refuse to drive to florida at night. tires, lumbar, iron, scraping chassis, you name it. too much going on out there, and hards hard enough in the daytime. and pick up trucks full of loose projectiles.
A few years ago I was riding shotgun with a friend on I-75 in Fl. As we passed a big rig, its left rear tire blew up right beside me ... about six feet away. Talk about pucker factor!!! I almost had to see a proctologist to remove the friend's seat cover from my backside. Thankfully, nothing came off the tire sideways fast enough to hit the car or me. This was not long after I watched the Mythbusters episode where they demonstrated a truck tire chunk going through a car window and decapitating Buster.
A friend and I were driving up to Toronto in his brand new 1998 Pontiac Gran Am. It was 4 in the morning and out from under the big rig in front of us (we were not tailgating) came the maimed carcus of a deer. No way to avoid it and you could feel it go under the floor boards. He asked "was that insulation"? I had to break the bad news to him. Stopped and saw the whole underside of the car covered in blood and hair. We were 3 hours into the trip and in upstate NY with no leaking fluids or dangling wires, so we continued on. The only hiccup along the way was the border crossing that took 6 hours to clear.
I like to follow semis at a safe distance because tail haters assume the truck is making me drive the speed limit
Beyond the debris and explosions and fumes..... In a Prius - or any normal-height car - you can't see over, around, or through any truck. You don't know if the car in front of the truck, or the car ten cars in front of the truck, has suddenly stopped, or crashed, or fallen into a sinkhole. So you have no idea if the truck might suddenly have to stop. That's always seemed to me reason enough to stay a significant distance behind any truck.
Roads are peculiar places, to be sure. Mostly populated by small vehicles whose driver's skills do not extend beyond a few tested-for low-speed maneuvers. Also populated by fewer, much larger vehicles that are very restricted (physics and engineering) in responses to 'events'. Regardless of training. Drivers in first category often assert "I had no way of knowing" how an event would play out. Well, yes you did. You got license because testing was too easy. You could have learned more, and acted 'defensively' in general, but you did not do that either.
