My trip home from MA this morning was waaaay more exciting than I had planned....

I had toyed around with the idea of driving home last night, but ironically, decided that the Taconic Parkway would be too dangerous at night because of the deer...I chose to sleep instead.

I got on the road about 4:45 AM. I took 23 south to the Taconic, and by that time it was day light. I was listening to the new Arlo 1969 CD, and about 5:30, I was making some progress...cruise control set at 57 mph, good music on, and all of a sudden at mile marker 60, a deer ran in front of the car...I saw it about a quarter of a second before I hit it. There was no time to do anything about it.
What is amazing is what didn't happen...it didn't hit the hood or windshield. I didn't roll over it. It flew up into the air, over the car (it was running fast when I hit it, and had some momentum) and spun head over tail. It landed in a 40-foot deep wooded ravine ( it didn't land in the road in front of another car!) on the right side of the road and it was a very dead deer. So sorry!

The car was also a big surprise; it has a piece of broken trim that went around the grille. The grille was popped in (It's been popped out, but will need replacing) and my license plate has more bends. There's a crack in the bumper beside a headlight that's full of deer hair. There's some deer barf on the right fender. That's it!~ I stopped at a little gas station that had a convinience store at the next exit to get some coffee and call the insurance company. A Honda mechanic was at the little store, too, and he examined the car...and said it was totally safe to drive; there was no mechanical damage.

Who woulda thought that you could hit a running deer at 57 mph and walk away with just a good fright and so little damage? I'm thankful the Gods were smiling, my guardian angel was looking out for me, and the only damage was cosmetic! I think if I had hit the brakes, the outcome could have been much worse, or involved other cars and people. I feel very badly for the deer, but there was absolutely nothing I could have done to prevent this.

I got home about 12:30..safely.

I'm glad you got home safely too

I'm glad for you too Sue, you were very lucky. I hit a dog (about 40-50 lbs) one night not long ago with my full-size GMC pick-up truck resulting in over $3,000.00 worth of damage; it DID roll up over the hood and through the windshield, and like the deer, it wasn't his lucky night either

Whew!

Sooo glad your okay!!!

Your Guardian Angel is really good! So glad you're OK!

Yup. I drive that same route home from the church always in the dark. My eyes are scanning for deer the entire 50 miles of it I take.They are right on the edge of the road munching most of the time. I pay special attention to any deer with antlers that grow in, because......well, you know! ( they are related to mooses of course)
Glad it came out ok for you Sue, if not the deer.

sue!!!
i know you feel bad for the deer, that is rough...but i am really glad you are okay!

Wow Sue
How very lucky you are. I am happy you walked away from that.
Deer are every where these days as len said always out at the side of the hi-way, most likely between dusk and dawn.
Where I live, we are very far from the road and our driveway goes through a ravine, every morning when I look out of the kitchen window there are always two or three deer, and then in the evening we see them out in the back field, I take out my compost stuff for them so they get extra food, Quincy used to run them off but he dosen't scare them now, they must sense that he wont hurt them.
The one thing I have noticed though is that thay seem to be more and more on the major hi-ways.
I drive to Ottawa which is approx a 40 min drive from my little village and I see so many of them dead at the side of the road. It breaks my heart. The problem here is there is way to much construction (mostly housing) work going on that the deer are being run off the land they live on and have very few places left to go. My husband and I hit one 10 years ago, we were fine but the deer was killed and our Mustang was fairly damaged . I would never want to do that again. so I watch carefully when I am driving for their eyes so I can slow down and hopefully avoid them.
Again I am happy you and your van are okay.
alex

Glad you weren't hurt. The Taconic State Parkway is one of the most dangerous roads anywhere for a variety of reasons. I used to take it instead of the Thruway when I drove to and from Saratoga Race Track from Long Island. I remember it well for the speed traps the troopers would set at the bottom of hills, where they would catch guys like me (twice!) who drove little underpowered 1978 Corollas with no cruise controls. You had to gain a lot of speed on the downhills in order to make it up the next hill!

I also remember, back in the day, that NY State Learner's Permits prohibited driving on the Taconic; wonder if they still have that restriction.


mikey

I replied to this but somehow it didn't show up. So sorry you had the run-in with the deer. Glad your are okay. That is so scary. Prayers just said for ya...

I am glad you came out ok, Sue. That was a scary thing. I once escaped a collision with a deer only by luck. As you said in a split second it was in view of my headlights and gone and if I had been there a quarter of a second sooner I would have hit it without a chance of breaking. And that was at a street where usually there is no deer.
Stay safe.

In South Texas it's a way of life.

You watch out for other traffic.....and deer. You know & you teach your kids to know. Even though you know...they can still surprise you at any given moment.

I have been very lucky, but had a surreal moment one night while heading for Langtry. (yep..home of Judge Roy Bean) Just past the Pecos High Bridge the road gets wider...thank goodness.

It's late and I'm in a hurry and I KNOW better, but I'm flyin' along in my lil red camero and I just happened to glance to my left. Biggest buck I have seen to date is just ....standing there. He is taller than the roof of my car. He is so close that if I had my hand raised and extended out the window, I could have clipped his nose with the tips of my fingers.

You know, I was doing maybe 60 or 65, but at that moment, it felt like 5 mph. Everything just seemed to S L O W D O W N. I looked at him...he looked at me. I didn't even take my foot off the gas until afterwards. (You can't really slam on the brakes..you may slip off into a canyon or something) I was just in shock for second but it sure seemed like stop-motion. It was a HUGE wake-up call. My car was all glass...I know I wouldn't have made it, had I hit him.

I creeped the rest of the way to Langtry.

I am just so so sorry you had to go through that Sue! It had to be scary as all get out! I'm so glad your okay!

Glad you're o.k. Sue.

So glad you're OK! So many things had to happen 'just so' for that to be the case. I hope your future Church trips are all more boring and uneventful.

Jim and I talked about it...and we both feel that if I had slammed on the brakes, the nose of the minivan would have dipped, and the trajectory of the deer probably would have been different...it would have been a lower speed hit, and it probably would have sent it through the windshield and into my lap, with bad things happening all around. Instead, it got flipped into the air and out of the way of people inside other vehicles.

Just like when our car was hit by lightning on the Blue Ridge Parkway about ten years ago, someone told me "Keep going, you'll be okay!" just before I hit it. I don't know who's been warning me, but I've learned to always listen.