Brush with a deer
 

About 6 pm my wife and I were cruising on a country road. No traffic, so I was running about 50 mph or a little under, as it is easier to talk with less wind noise. On the left of the road the grade dropped off fairly rappidly and the woods came within 20 yards of the road. A deer popped out of no where about 100 feet in front of me on a dead run. I smashed the brakes and didn't think there was a chance of missing it. I never heard or felt any impact, but its hind quarter went forward as it move past the car. My wife said it was a good thing it zagged or we would have hit it. I told her we may have bumped it. I can find no damage to the car or marks. so I guess it zigged.

Hitting a deer has been my #1 concern since buying the Cobra. As I suspected, it looks like you will hit so low on their legs that they are going to slide right up the hood.

Hitting any animal while driving at night has become a phobia to me no matter what vehicle I am driving. The good news is, that if you do hit a deer, chances are very high it will actually be a case where the deer hits you. They do tend to run into the side of a vehicle vs wind up in front.

I hit a bear once....very scary....saw a set of 3 inch long claws fly up in the air. Knocked bear out. Grill, bumper, headlights, etc, all damaged. I can just imagine how worse it would be if I had been driving the Cobra. Oh...Bear finally woke up, checked itself out, and ran off like a scalded cat.

I also had a moose come out and race me as I drove my old Toyota truck along route 9 to Bangor, Maine. Now that would be definately be bad to hit in a Cobra...forget the damage to the car.....driver and passenger probably wouldn't make it....some of them are upwards of 1200 lbs vs a deer at typically less than 200 lbs.

Glad you made it out OK. Makes me think of brake upgrades I have been putting off.

I was considering this on the drive home tonight. What would be the best approach if the hit is unavoidable? I know some owners have died trying to swerve around a deer...

All you can do is duck....if you can react that fast. Never good to try and avoid hitting one, just hit it.

Consider yourself lucky, a friends...friend hit one Friday night on a motorcycle and was killed.
I try and limit the driving after dark in the cobra which is getting harder as it gets darker earlier and earlier.

My brother was once driving home after a company picnic in the country outside Oklahoma City. He was driving a company pickup that had the bed filled with ice and beer cans. Coming over a rise in the road he hit a motorcycle. Soon the police arrived & the scene was complete chaos. Their were dozens of beer cans everywhere all over the road. The motorcycle was lodged under the pickup. The rider had been decapitated and was some distance away laying partially in a ditch. His head was still in his helmet. It looked like my brother's career as a CPA for a medical corporation was over.

But one policeman was taking a good look at the helmet/head of the motorcyclist. He noticed a small piece of strange debris lodged in the face mask. Something so small it might have fallen away when the head was moved. It was a piece of cow hair. The cop started looked beyond the immediate accident scene. He soon found a cow in the field that was dead.

The police were able to reconstruct the timeline as follows: The cow wandered on to the road & was hit by the motorcyclist. The rider was immediately decapitated. The cow wondered off and died. Soon thereafter my brother crested the hill & hit the motorcycle.

The road is a dangerous place, we all have to be on guard as much as possible. You never know what is over the next hill.

Z. Ray

It happened so fast, very little went through my mind. I just knew the tires were howling too much to attempt a swirv and letting up on the brakes was not an option.

Reflecting after the fact, my only other option would have been to aim for the left side of the road. Do to the speed of the deer, I think if I had swirved and not braked, I would have hit it. Actually if I had not braked it would have hit the side of the car. Perhaps it would have landed in the cock pit. It was in the air before it entered the road way and was past the center of my lane before its hooves touched the asphault. It was running flat out.

In the little area I live in there are at least 20 deer/elk collisions a year. There are a few fatalities, mostly be people who aren't from around here and don't know to watch the sides of the road. Almost everyone drives with high beams on, and noone whines too much - even a cop coming at you - because everyone needs the lights on the sides to see the critters.

Now for funny: I was going home the other day in the Cobra and actually slowed down and honked at a prairie rat (some of you might call them prairie dogs). I could just see this vermin whacking my oil cooler with his gnarly teeth to spite me before its brains collided with the car.

About 10 years ago, I hit a deer with my Porsche 944 Turbo, at about 80 mph, in central Oregon. I saw it bound once in the other lane and then my rearview mirror and Escort blew past my head in a shower of glass as it took out the windshield. It wiped out most of the front end (except for the plastic nose); severely flat spotted the fronts; and filled up the drivers seat. The cop said, after I told him my speed, "Good thing. If you'd been doing 55 mph, we probably wouldn't be having this conversation!" He had investigated numerous fatalities in past years where folks were obeying the speed limit and hit deer. Most were sports cars with low, sloping front ends. My speed sent it over the top instead of coming inside. I tried, but couldn't get him to buy off on OKing 80+ for future trips.

Bob Mc

Hitting a deer and having slide up through the windshield would not be a good thing for the driver and passenger.

For all those who drive the Taconic in New York, there are several sections were Bambi thinks the edge of the road (literally within 3 feet) is the best place to dine. This is in the middle of the day.

There is NO room to manuever if they decide to get spooked.

Replaced a fender and door from hitting a deer.

You do not want to hit one. Funny thing is, the insurance company will not cover an accident if you MISS the deer, but you are fully covered if you hit it. Go figure.

:eek:

I did the bear thing in NH many moons ago, with a 2-door Olds Cutlass:JEKYLHYDE...

Bear came out from behind a left-side guardrail at a full gallop moving toward the median on I-89, just south of that little ski area up near VT... Whaleback??? A quarter of a second more and I think I would have missed it.

It made it past the passenger's side, but I hit its hind quarters just about a third of the way in on the driver's side... hit the brakes but no time to slow down much. Took out the car's fiberglass nose, one of the hinged grill pieces, and the driver's side fender... even cracked the plastic fender well on that side.

Bear disappeared as I went by... went back but didn't see anything. Stopped at the next rest area and called the Troopers for insurance report. He was skeptical:rolleyes:... 'til he went to inspect and found bear hair on the car:cool:!

Almost hit a deer in Maryland last fall on my way to see Naumoff and his Unique 427... inches... just a few inches. Had I not been going pretty slowly, I would have tagged it good.

Can't imagine taking either one in a Cobra:eek:!

We have tons of deer around here (Valley Forge) It is almost like a deer farm! LOL
About the only thing you can do is Duck! Needless to say I do not wear shoulder belts around here. It would really suck to see that deer coming through the windshield and be totally strapped in:eek:

Deer
 

We have deer in our neighborhood. I have counted 13 in my front yard at one time. I live in town. I have to drive 7/10 of a mile from the main Hiway to my neighborhood. Woods on both sides, seven curves, down hill and then up the hill to the first stop sign. Deer cross all the time. This year we have a doe with 3 fawn that are not afraid of cars. We have to stop and let them cross "slowly". If I want to run this piece of road at speed, I let my sidepipes warn the deer that I'm coming. In nine years I never have seen a deer in my Cobra. But I'm always watching for them.

Dwight

With the arrival of Autumn the deer up here in Wisconsin start acting really crazy; I think they know hunting season is fast approaching and their days are numbered. What we have to watch for is not deer #1 running in front of you, its his pals, #2, #3, and #4 that seem to come out from no where just after you have relaxed from avoiding #1! We have a body shop up here that offers a $500.00 discount off of estimates for "deer damage," good marketing, huh?

Hard to duck if you are wearing a four or five point harness. You're a sitting duck, and the windshield will give you zero protection.

At Sturgis bike week a couple of years ago. I had a deer run between my buddy on the lead bike and me I was 2nd in line. Missed him by about 4 feet. 3 more deer followed after him but was behind our group. It took a while to quit shaking after that. That is a close as I ever want to come to hitting one. One of my wife employees was in a vette convertable when they hit a deer and it ended in the seat on top of her. She wasn't hurt but it took the EMT's a long time to figure out all the blood was from the deer. She was really hot, it ruined a new pair of shorts :-)

You are fully covered whether you hit the deer or miss the deer and veer off the road and hit a tree. Either way, the deer probably has no insurance so you would pay your deductible and get your vehicle fixed.