The role of Lady Luck...

"When you starts driving, you start with a pot full of luck and an empty pot of
experience. The art of driving safe is to fill your pot of experience without letting
the pot of luck go dry". I have read this line in a couple of biking/touring forums
and always wondered about it. It is so true. Though you may be an extremely careful
driver, sometimes, the sheer stupidity of others may put you into a position where
your experience cannot bail you out, but your lady luck may.

S is an extremely competent and safe driver. He have lot of expertise, and have done
quiet a lot of driving in various conditions. I can any day vouch for his driving, and
if I have to trust my life at ones driving, S is one guy I can blindly trust to take me
safe from anywhere to anywhere.
We have done many long trips (driving and riding) together, and
I have never seen him exceeding 100 kmph - he is a guy who always like to play it
safe. The only time I saw him pushing his ambassador to the maximum speed, well past
100 kmph; was when he was trying to take an accident victim to the hospital.

We where on the return leg of a long drive, on NH 47, and it was raining slightly. We
saw a white ambassador, with lights on and blaring horn, coming down very
fast, trying to overtake us. S promptly gave way for him and we both exchanged couple
of remarks about the foolishness of driving so fast on a wet road. We kept driving steadily, and soon we saw a big crowd in front of us, blocking the road. We stopped the car and saw that a tree
fell from the side, and it nearly crushed the car which over took us. But luckily, the
tree fell on the rear of the car, sparing the driver and passenger. The passenger
escaped unhurt, but the driver was bleeding, and so S took both of them to hospital -
and it is the only time I have seen him pushing the car to its limit.


The inroads - the roads which connects the villages - they are usually narrow and
winding in Kerala. Yesterday, S and G (wifi of S) where going for a long drive, and on
the way there is a series of curves which are kind of accident prone. It is very near
to the home of S, so he was very cautious and he took them as usual - slow and safe,
honking at each turn. A Mahindra Bolero was coming in the opposite direction, and it
was coming so fast that, when the driver heard the horn of S's car, he almost stood
on his break, and in the force, the jeep did a ninety degree turn and skidded and the
back of the jeep came and hit S's car between the right side tyre well and front door
hinges.
The guy was out of his mind to driving so fast in a narrow road like that, and
only by gods grace that the hit was on a spot where the shock was absorbed by the car
with minimal structural damage, isolating the passengers. If the hit had been on the
door, S could have been seriously injured, and if the hit have been on the tyre well
or on the side of the bonnet, S could easily could have lost control. By Gods grace,
what could have been a serious disaster turned out to be a not so serious accident.

It just sent me thinking - no matter how careful we are, some times, lady luck have
to smile on us. Experience alone cannot bail you out all the time.

PS: Yesterday I read in the newspaper about an accident. A bus was coming down a ghat
section and a tree fell on the bus. The driver saw the tree falling down, and he had
two options - stop the bus and get crushed, or take the bus so that he will be saved,
but passengers will get crushed. He chose to stop the bus, and the brave guy lost his
life, but saved the life of all the other people in the bus. I salute his spirit. If
only the people who are blasting the bombs and paying the horse trade in politics had
at least 10% of his conscience.

Suma, at last, I did break that jinx of drying out :)