Roger Halstead wrote:
On Sat, 13 Dec 2003 02:57:11 GMT, "Matthew S. Whiting"
wrote:

snip

I was taught, no matter what the target, don't suddenly swerve. In
heavy traffic swerving can cause more problems than it solves.

In heavy traffic, I agree. With no traffic, I completely disagree.
Swerving is by far the most effective avoidance maneuver if you have a
place to swerve too. This is true of cars, motorcycles, and
particularly, airplanes. It is especially hard to stop the latter, even
when on the ground! If you were taught to never, ever swerve, then you
should ask for your money back as you had a lousy teacher.


Like seat belts you are playing the odds. Always maintain control as
long as possible.

Absolutely. I never suggested losing control.


I had an SUV pull out in front of my Transam a couple years back. Had
I swerved left I'd still have hit him, but it would have driven me
right into oncoming traffic and spun him. Had I swerved right I'd
have driven him right into that oncoming traffic and it would have put
what was left of the TA into the big trees.

Traffic was very heavy. When the parts settled two more cars coming
from the other direction swerved to avoid the cars slowing down and
they hit the SUV which was now setting in the left turn lane.
That traffic doesn't slow for anything including stopped cars or icy
road.

Read what I wrote earlier. I never suggested swerving into either
traffic or large fixed objects. Nice that you snipped out the relevant
parts of my previous post(s).


Matt