I just stared straight ahead. I couldn't even pull over because I was on a long stretch of a bridge. After the bridge ended, he drove in the grass beside the road, cut me off, almost crashing into the right side of my vehicle and then immediately started slamming on his breaks in front of me so that I had to swerve into the grass. After that, he took off like a rocket down the road.
This incident terrified me. I had literally no idea how to handle it. I was in a situation where I couldn't pull over and let him pass me, but I still felt like someone could've gotten hurt if he rammed into my bumper when I was driving over a bride. Is this something I could have called the police with? Would they have been able to charge him with reckless driving if they weren't present?
You drive your car; others drive theirs. You can't do anything to improve a wacked out driver so don't try. Going the speed limit has helped me a lot - people get close for a moment then back off when they see I am going to hold the speed limit. When I was going 5 mph over they always tried to "push" me up to ten over.
Driving is a numbers game. We encounter a hundred drivers in a few minutes of urban driving. Out of that hundred, odds are one will be the worst driver in a hundred, two will be new drivers with less than a year experience and two will be drivers who will be unable to drive next year. One will be schizophrenic, 4 will be bipolar (3 of them severely), 4 will have clinical rage problems and 4 meet the criteria for sociopathy. 7 will be alcoholics and a variable number will be addicted to various other drugs. 2 or 3 of them will be convicted felons and 20 of them - 1 in 5 - beats his or her significant other... boy or girl friend, husband or wife. About 10 were fired in the last year. Discounting overlap, that is about half the drivers.
That was pretty wacky but you notice he never hit your car... or his. Though this be madness, yet there is method in't. In 40 years of driving I have never been crashed into by a tailgater or even the guy who swore he would crash his car into mine if I didn't get out of the drive-through line ahead of him.
The police can't do much if they were not there and there is no advantage in pointlessly making an enemy you already know is unstable. He has already forgotten you and gone on to the next target of the dark thing in his mind. You can go back to your happy life. You win.
There's nothing to handle. Some people are just walking talking rectums, and you encountered one.
No, cops can't lay traffic charges without solid evidence. And your say-so that this guy was driving aggressively is not solid evidence. They pretty much need an admission on record from the suspected driver or they need to see it happen themselves.
Just from reading your story, I'm picking something up about you: You have an unhealthy fear of bridges. It's OK to be cautious about bridges, especially in bad weather (high wind, rain, ice), but you're bordering on paranoid. That's not healthy. I also know that there are three sides to every traffic story: One side, the other side, and what really happened. I'm not accusing you of lying, but I am accusing you of being a lot like absolutely everyone in the world who drives. And based on that theory (which is pretty much a scientific fact), I'm going to surmise that you were going a lot slower than 5 over the limit when you hit a bridge. Fear does that to people.
One way to 'handle' this is to get over your gripping fear of driving over water. That's a really common thing, you're not even close to being alone, but fear can and will do bad things. Fear is like fire. It's a good servant, but a ruthless master. Get professional help if you need to, but you need to beat this fear of bridges or it will own you.
I'm not saying any of this was your fault, because the driver of the truck is definitely a douche bag. But you asked how to avoid situations like this, and that's how you do it.
If he rammed into you bumper when you were "driving over a bride", then the ramming wouldn't really be as important as that you drive over a bride and probably killed her.
Seriously though, you did the right thing on the bridge. You keep driving, at the correct speed, and do not respond to the shouting, lights, etc.
After the bridge ended, you did one thing wrong. As soon as he was no longer behind you because he "drove in the grass beside the road", you should have you should have slowed down so that he would be far ahead of you and (i) he would not cut you off when he reeentered the road and (ii) you would not have to swerve when he started slamming on his brakes.
One thing to do is hold your phone out of the window and film them. I've found this makes them back off. If they don't take the footage to the police. I'd expect that a film of your incident would have got him in court.
i usually slam on brakes. scares the **** out of every tailgaiter i ever had.
if he hits you, which he wont, sue the bastard
Ignore them, simple as that.
you should reported to the police?
