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Seattle Snowpocalypse

Started by corco, November 23, 2010, 01:10:56 PM

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corco

For those of you that live in areas that get snow, I suspect you'll find this video amusing. Those of you that don't will probably find it scary.

I highly recommend watching it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhZCyQ3emQg

When I lived in Seattle, I always remembered that the first rule to driving in snow there was that the conditions weren't that scary- it was the sheer number of drivers that had no idea what they were doing.

May this serve as a further reminder that if you start to lose control, don't slam your dang brakes!


Truvelo

All those idiots in big SUV's think that because their vehicle is 4WD they are invincible. There's one from 1:20 who's making a right fool of himself and then after that is what looks like a Subaru Forester mounting the sidewalk and almost into someone's yard.
Speed limits limit life

corco

Yeah, that part was ridiculous. That's an Acura MDX too- not exactly a vehicle with an excellent 4WD system. That Forester was going way, way too fast.

My favorite part is the pedestrians- there's all these vehicles sliding around like crazy and they just walk by like nothing is going on- I'd be scared for my life!

I really have no idea how that bus could have been going that slowly and then ended up sideways- that took some serious bad reactive driving on the part of the driver. I'd have hoped bus drivers were trained better for that sort of thing.

Truvelo

It's hard to see from the video but there may have been passengers on board that bus.
Speed limits limit life

corco

There were at least a couple- there's a comment in the thread:
QuoteI was on that 43...after we stopped there was a general feeling of, "Well. That just happened." The bus driver was shaken but everyone was totally fine. And, for the record, the driver had called Metro services to see if she should reroute along 14th or just stop at 15th and they told her to go down John, so boo to them.


Chris

Funny video, seeing those SUV drivers attempting to scale this grade!

Stephane Dumas

I wondered if they switched from summer tires to winter tires? I don't recommand 4-seasons tires.

Here an "icepocalypse" from Portland OR in 2007

realjd

Quote from: corco on November 23, 2010, 01:10:56 PM
May this serve as a further reminder that if you start to lose control, don't slam your dang brakes!

Unless you have anti-lock breaks, in which case that's exactly what you do.

Quote from: Truvelo on November 23, 2010, 01:32:42 PM
All those idiots in big SUV's think that because their vehicle is 4WD they are invincible. There's one from 1:20 who's making a right fool of himself and then after that is what looks like a Subaru Forester mounting the sidewalk and almost into someone's yard.

4WD will help you get going more quickly in the ice and snow, but the extra weight of an SUV means they have a longer stopping distance when compared to a car. Idiots think that 4WD with traction control means they can stop better too!

Brandon

Quote from: Stephane Dumas on November 23, 2010, 07:14:25 PM
I wondered if they switched from summer tires to winter tires? I don't recommand 4-seasons tires.

No difference, IMHO.  We use all season tires here in Chicagoland and never suffer this kind of idiocy in the snow.  Driving technique and style matters more.
"If you think this has a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention." - Ramsay Bolton

"Symbolic of his struggle against reality." - Reg

Truvelo

Quote from: Stephane Dumas on November 23, 2010, 07:14:25 PM
Here an "icepocalypse" from Portland OR in 2007

That video looks like something from the Grand Theft Auto game.
Speed limits limit life

Scott5114

Quote from: Stephane Dumas on November 23, 2010, 07:14:25 PM
I wondered if they switched from summer tires to winter tires? I don't recommand 4-seasons tires.

In places like this that don't see snow often there's no point in keeping winter tires around. Here in Oklahoma, special snow tires and chains and the like are completely unknown, because we normally get snow once per year. Most intelligent people here will simply stay home from work until the roads get plowed and conditions are more favorable.
uncontrollable freak sardine salad chef

mightyace

I don't know who still uses winter tires.

I lived in Northeast Ohio, which sees significant snow each year and always used all-season tires.

My Dad switched to all-season tires 25-30 years ago in PA.  In both areas, I haven't seen winter tires for sale.

Maybe areas like the Sierra Nevadas, Alaska and other extreme winter environments still use them.
My Flickr Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mightyace

I'm out of this F***KING PLACE!

PAHighways

Quote from: corco on November 23, 2010, 01:10:56 PMFor those of you that live in areas that get snow, I suspect you'll find this video amusing.

It made me shake my head.  This is nothing compared to what I found on my return to Pittsburgh International in February after a few days in rainy California.

I know Seattle gets more rain than snow, but people should know to drive cautiously in hazardous conditions.  In the case of attempting to climb a hill or descend a hill, find an alternate route.

J N Winkler

Quote from: Scott5114 on November 24, 2010, 11:57:04 AMIn places like this that don't see snow often there's no point in keeping winter tires around. Here in Oklahoma, special snow tires and chains and the like are completely unknown, because we normally get snow once per year. Most intelligent people here will simply stay home from work until the roads get plowed and conditions are more favorable.

In Kansas we get a little more snow than this but I have never actually laid eyes on studded tires or an engine block heater, though in Alberta I saw car parks with outlets in front of each stall to feed engine heaters.  The one and only time I actually saw a set of tire chains was years ago when my Swiss cousin showed them to me, to demonstrate what is needed in the mountains during the winter.
"It is necessary to spend a hundred lire now to save a thousand lire later."--Piero Puricelli, explaining the need for a first-class road system to Benito Mussolini

froggie

QuoteI don't know who still uses winter tires.

New England.  Vermont, at least...

Quoteor an engine block heater

Fairly common in Minnesota.  Or at least they used to be.

J N Winkler

#15
I was told by a car salesman years ago that engine block heaters (which are typically offered as an extra-cost option in new cars, especially American models) were rare south of South Dakota.  It doesn't surprise me though that they are common in Minnesota because it is in the same Köppen climate zone as eastern SD.
"It is necessary to spend a hundred lire now to save a thousand lire later."--Piero Puricelli, explaining the need for a first-class road system to Benito Mussolini

Alps

Quote from: mightyace on November 24, 2010, 12:17:52 PM
I don't know who still uses winter tires.

I should.  Commuting can be an adventure at times.

JREwing78

They were genuinely useful in the snow belt in Michigan. I didn't strictly need them to get around (most of the time), but they were far safer to drive on than all-seasons.

Only reason I haven't gotten them here is that I'm pretty destitute at the moment.

corco

#18
QuoteUnless you have anti-lock breaks, in which case that's exactly what you do.

False. ABS keeps your brakes from locking on the wheels so you don't die, but it still keeps your wheels from spinning. Your wheels need to spin to regain traction. Most of the vehicles in that video were new enough to be ABS equipped but their wheels weren't spinning- that's because they were doing it wrong.

Even with ABS, the way you keep from being like the Corolla at the beginning (if you're already going to fast) is by lightly tapping your brakes to slow and then very very slowly apply increasing pressure, and if you start to slide you let off and try again. You don't need to pump your brakes like you do without ABS, but you don't push the brake pedal as hard as it will go either in a situation like that.

It's hard to explain without being behind the wheel. You don't do a full on non-ABS pump (I've had cars without ABS), but it's more delayed- you brake for a while, then take your foot off the brake for a slightly shorter while if you start to lose traction, then brake for a while, then repeat. Holding your foot on the brake with no traction even if you have ABS still = locked wheels.

ABS is like 4-wheel drive. It's a nice convenience, but if you start slamming your brakes thinking "I have ABS, the car will take care of it," you'll end up like the Corolla at the beginning of the video. 

I'd guide you to this for a good explanation of what I'm talking about
http://www.ehow.com/about_6162289_do-brakes-work-ice-snow_.html
QuoteUnder severe conditions when the entire road is covered with ice, all four wheels may lock simultaneously. Unless at least one wheel is turning, the ABS will react as if the vehicle has stopped. When this occurs, the ABS is defeated, and the driver will need to go back to the pumping technique.

Although that situation really should never develop if you're paying any attention. Had that Corolla just started the hill in 1st or L, the engine would have braked for them to the point that they should have reasonably easily been able to come to a stop.

QuoteI don't know who still uses winter tires.

I do, as do most of the people I know in Idaho/Wyoming. The reason being that we have to do a LOT of interstate driving on really bad roads, so may as well be extra safe about it (I'd hazard I drove 10,000 miles on bad roads just last winter- roads generally aren't as well cleared out here and you have to drive a really long distance to get anywhere, plus I live 800 miles from home, so miles add up really quickly). When I lived in Seattle and when I move to Nebraska I'll stop putting them on, but in Idaho and Wyoming it seems like the roads are bad on more than 50% of miles driven during the winter, so having them is justified.

QuoteNo difference, IMHO.  We use all season tires here in Chicagoland and never suffer this kind of idiocy in the snow.  Driving technique and style matters more.

I would submit that good tires are the single most important car-related thing anybody can do, but driving technique and style is without a doubt the most important. I drove a 1997 Ford Escort with all seasons 150 miles in a snowstorm through the mountains yesterday without incident- it's just a matter of being safe about it.

If I had to brake it down I would say it's 77% driving ability, 12% tires, 7% drivetrain (4WD/AWD/FWD/RWD), 3% transmission (if you know how to drive a manual there is no question a manual is better in snow), 1% random safety features your car has like ABS and stability control.

english si

We had a sprinkling (that's perhaps too strong a word) flakes last night and some more this afternoon. None of it lasted long before melting.

A inch of snow will bring this area into chaos.

realjd

Quote from: corco on November 25, 2010, 10:49:19 AM
QuoteUnless you have anti-lock breaks, in which case that's exactly what you do.

False. ABS keeps your brakes from locking on the wheels so you don't die, but it still keeps your wheels from spinning. Your wheels need to spin to regain traction. Most of the vehicles in that video were new enough to be ABS equipped but their wheels weren't spinning- that's because they were doing it wrong.

Even with ABS, the way you keep from being like the Corolla at the beginning (if you're already going to fast) is by lightly tapping your brakes to slow and then very very slowly apply increasing pressure, and if you start to slide you let off and try again. You don't need to pump your brakes like you do without ABS, but you don't push the brake pedal as hard as it will go either in a situation like that.

It's hard to explain without being behind the wheel. You don't do a full on non-ABS pump (I've had cars without ABS), but it's more delayed- you brake for a while, then take your foot off the brake for a slightly shorter while if you start to lose traction, then brake for a while, then repeat. Holding your foot on the brake with no traction even if you have ABS still = locked wheels.

ABS is like 4-wheel drive. It's a nice convenience, but if you start slamming your brakes thinking "I have ABS, the car will take care of it," you'll end up like the Corolla at the beginning of the video. 

I'd guide you to this for a good explanation of what I'm talking about
http://www.ehow.com/about_6162289_do-brakes-work-ice-snow_.html
QuoteUnder severe conditions when the entire road is covered with ice, all four wheels may lock simultaneously. Unless at least one wheel is turning, the ABS will react as if the vehicle has stopped. When this occurs, the ABS is defeated, and the driver will need to go back to the pumping technique.

Although that situation really should never develop if you're paying any attention. Had that Corolla just started the hill in 1st or L, the engine would have braked for them to the point that they should have reasonably easily been able to come to a stop.

Although I live in Florida now, I grew up driving cars without ABS in Indiana where we got our fair share of snow. Nothing like y'all up in ID get, but still enough that I've had plenty of practice driving in the snow. What you describe is definitely proper technique for stopping without ABS (and far more efficient than "pumping"). It's called threshold braking.

You make it sound like the brakes locking and the wheels not spinning are two different phenomenon. They're not. The brakes locking up is simply when the wheels stop spinning before the car is stopped.

What ABS do is exactly what you describe as proper stopping technique, except they do it automatically. They let the computer find that exact point where maximum brake pressure is applied (on a per-wheel basis) without the wheel locking up. They're not foolproof; if you're on a uniformly smooth surface like ice (which is what your link describes), all four wheels will lock simultaneously and the car will still skid because the ABS system assumes the car is stopped. On a surface like snow where the traction isn't uniform, as long as all four wheels don't lock simultaneously, they'll find that maximum braking pressure for you. Of course if the snow is deep enough, you WANT the wheels to lock up because friction from the tires sliding (not rolling) into the deep snow ahead will stop you quicker.

While ABS is common, it still isn't standard on all cars. My current car, an '01 Accord doesn't have them (even though it has just about every other option available), and I still get rental cars without them fairly often. A large number of cars here in Florida just don't have them.

As for tires, I've never driven a car with snow tires, but Indiana didn't have mountains so all-weather tires did just fine. And like you said, technique matters most.

Wikipedia has a great overview on ABS and has links to some studies about their effectiveness:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-lock_braking_system

corco

#21
Interesting. Most of the cars I drive don't have ABS- although my primary vehicle does. The only time it ever kicks in for me is when I'm coming up at a slick light a little bit too fast, and in that instance I just slam hard and I do let the ABS take care of it (this has never been a distance of more than like 6 feet where i'm going more than about 2 MPH when the brakes kick in ).

I've never gotten myself into a situation remotely like that Corolla where I've needed to rely on ABS (or manual pumping) at a high speed over a long distance, so I don't actually know what ABS would do- I just assumed that was the situation there.

I suspect 99% of the US population has no use for snow tires and would be wasting their money buying them- I just happen to regularly commute back and forth between two places that do. It's a weird outlier.

mightyace

I finally got a change to watch the video.  (YouTube is blocked at work.  :angry:)

Those people who couldn't make it up the hill made a big mistake in trying to climb a slippery hill.

They were going TOO slow.  You need some momentum (20-25 mph) to keep going.  During the rare snows here in TN, I see idiots stop at the bottom of a hill.  It becomes almost impossible to climb one if you stop first.
My Flickr Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mightyace

I'm out of this F***KING PLACE!

KEK Inc.

Yeah, I remember that storm.  I was at UW at the time, but I had to go down to the Portland Area for Thanksgiving Break, and my friend drove in his RWD Mustang.  He lives in Redmond, and what usually is a 20 minute drive to UW to pick me and my other friend up, took 2.5 hours.  Fortunately, the freeways were moderately clear, and we were able to go about 55 until Olympia where we finally saw bare pavement.
Take the road less traveled.

Henry

Quote from: KEK Inc. on December 29, 2010, 03:17:09 PM
Yeah, I remember that storm.  I was at UW at the time, but I had to go down to the Portland Area for Thanksgiving Break, and my friend drove in his RWD Mustang.  He lives in Redmond, and what usually is a 20 minute drive to UW to pick me and my other friend up, took 2.5 hours.  Fortunately, the freeways were moderately clear, and we were able to go about 55 until Olympia where we finally saw bare pavement.

I remember it too. And that video was way too funny not to watch, especially with all those cars sliding all over! :pan:
Go Cubs Go! Go Cubs Go! Hey Chicago, what do you say? The Cubs are gonna win today!



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