Commuting on I-405 in Bellevue, WA area, I see flying debris every now and then.  Usually it's leaves, plastic bags, pebbles, and occasional burning cigarettes flying at me. 

This past Friday, I was going home, following a metro bus.  The traffic in the HOV lane was moving quite nicely, despite Friday evening traffic.  I was following the bus with a 2-second gap, staying slightly toward the right side of the lane.  I wanted to be seen by jackasses wanting to cut in. 

All of a sudden, the bus ran over a piece of 4' x 8' plywood with it's left rear tires.  The tires and turbulence from bus kicked up the plywood right behind it.  The wind caught the now vertical plywood and, like a sail, it shifted violently sideways toward the lane of traffic.

With a split second to react, I shifted my weight and counter steered to move the bike to the right.  I managed to moved to the most right of the HOV lane.  But with the counter steering, I also have my left shoulder sticking out.  The flying plywood of death probably missed my left shoulder by about a foot.  I got the bike back in line and looked at the rear view mirror to confirm what had just happened wasn't a dream.  I then saw the VW Jetta behind me having splinters for dinner.

Geeeeeeeeez Louis....

I hope you checked your pants for any stains after that, jesus!!!

Glad you're okay!

And good on ya for the cat-like speed and reflexes!

Nice save!   

Holy shit! Glad you dodged that one... literally. I've had stuff kicked up in front of me (pieces of blown truck tires, hub caps, general crap...) but never a 4x8 piece of plywood! You are one lucky (and quick reacting!!) dude. You could have been sharing those dinner splinters with the V-Dub.

Are we talking about the same 405 in Belleview?  It was moving?? on a Friday?! 

Glad to hear you got out unscathed.    I got caught a few years ago by the flying cardboard of death.  That hurt bad enough.  That plywood would've sheered off a limb!

Quote from: IZ on January 30, 2012, 01:32:12 PM
Are we talking about the same 405 in Belleview?  It was moving?? on a Friday?!  

That section of the 405 was just south of New Castle so it had already cleared the i-90 nighmare.  Oh, forgot to mention that I sneaked out early on Friday so it was around 4 - 4:30pm.  HOV was moving pretty good.

I didn't react that quickly...  I had plenty of room between me and the bus (about 2 sec).  It was more like - ummmm....  WTF?....  (plywood caught the wind)...  Oh sh*t....  move damnit move....  OMG OMG, I can still feel my left hand... 

I tend to have bigger distance behind bigger vihecles so I don't get blocked and disappear from view.  Luckily that helped me dodged a bullet this time, too.

I'm from the Bellevue area!! The merge of 405 and 90 is terrible completely agreed!! When I was going to school during the summer at the UW I had to do that merge 5 days a week right during rush our... Worst engineering design ever...

Glad your all good though! 

That wooda hurt!  Good job

Wow.

I thought billowing, long tendrils of shrinkwrap blowing across 70MPH two-lane were bad....

Quote from: Capn Krunch on January 30, 2012, 02:56:33 PM
I'm from the Bellevue area!! The merge of 405 and 90 is terrible completely agreed!!  Worst engineering design ever...

Glad your all good though!  

http://g.co/maps/s5ebr

I like all this stuff around exit 9, 10a & 10b.

I'm glad I'm not doing that stuff anymore.

I used to have to do this one before they fixed it.
http://g.co/maps/tdk57

The 880 is bad for having mattresses, pieces of Iron and bits of furniture lying in the road.

Kirkland to the Bus stop for the s/o to cross waterbridge and then on to BSD was enough for me.  Not too bad but it took forever just to go a few miles.  Don't miss the driving there! 

that would have split you like a mango

take MSF much?

wheeeeeeeeeeew!

that was a nice save 

i had that happen to me once, but i was doing 85+ in my week old GTI
4x8 flew out of the pickup truck in front of me, and was flipping end to end through the air
i quickly moved into the breakdown lane and avoided it completely...
i never stopped or slowed down

both guys in the car said i was the most awesome driver EVER 
i had a heart attack 

I used to work in Emeryville and drive or rode to East Oakland 5 days a week. Hubcaps hurt!

Quote from: D Paoli on January 30, 2012, 04:13:22 PM

http://g.co/maps/s5ebr

I like all this stuff around exit 9, 10a & 10b.

I'm glad I'm not doing that stuff anymore.

I used to have to do this one before they fixed it.
http://g.co/maps/tdk57

The 880 is bad for having mattresses, pieces of Iron and bits of furniture lying in the road.

Quote from: TiNi on January 31, 2012, 02:49:50 AM
i had a heart attack 

That just about sums it up