| Author | Message | ||
     Ar15ed |
good grief! i just hit a full grown raccoon at 50 mph! i was cruising along shortly before dark, and it just darted out of the weeds straight out in front of my front wheel. it yanked the handlebar pretty violently, and popped the rear wheel up kinda sharply, but no real damage. i just let the bar do what it wanted to, and it settled right back out. i reckon that is the first thing i have really hit on a motorcycle in 31 years of riding. my dad hit a squirrel on his goldwing a few years ago, and it set up a pretty violent tank-slapper, and he barely kept it up. that was what flashed through my mind immediately! | ||
| Vito |
I HATE raccoons. Just HATE em. They seem to think my cat door is their invitation for free food and drink! Few too many are sleepin with da fishes now! | ||
| Supafast |
I barely missed a ground hog yesterday. I think I ran over its tail hairs. It was way close! Same as you, I was doing about 50 and had to jam on the brakes. Glad you are safe! I hate it when critters dart in front of me! Deer are the worst! Several close calls with them too...... | ||
| Jeffroj |
Wow, I nearly missed a dog standing in the middle of the road, literally 2 hours ago. I was about a 1/2 mile from home, and there were two of them, luckily the one standing in the street turned around and walked off at the last millisecond, because there was no way I was stopping in time. When I got home I could still smell my brakes! Still have a weak feeling in my knees. I hate when people let their pets run wild! Glad you were able to keep it up. | ||
| Fltwistygirl |
Glad you're ok and are living proof its possible to recover from an encounter with one one of those critters on a m/c. I see them ALL THE TIME on my early a.m. commute and the thought of hitting one is pretty skeevy. B. | ||
| Fast1075 |
I have hit a 'possums and an armadillo before...but my buddy takes the cake...he hit a 6 foot alligator and didn't crash.. The Army-Diller took me out. You never know what is around that next corner in Florida.  | ||
| Xbmacon |
a buddy of mine had a run-in with an armadillo on a gixxer. Luckily he hit it just right and kept it up and said it was like hitting a speed bump at 50. | ||
| Firebolt32 |
You never know what is around that next corner in Florida. Like those big ass Whoopin crane birds! I nearly was taken out by one a while back. I was able to duck under it. I bet at freaked you out for a sec, Ar15ed? | ||
| Dsword |
Here in WI, we get deer. Hit one last October, rut season. Never saw it until his head hit the windshield of my Softail. Broke the windshield, right mirror came off, brake handle bent, knocked my hand off the throttle, his body bounced off the tank and my knee and by the grace of God, I held on through tank slappers and kept it upright. Turned around, found him laying with his tongue hanging out on the side of the road. Called the cops, as the cop is driving up and running over the deer racks that broke off (crunch, crunch!, six points), the deer sat up, then stood up and walked away! He was knocked out cold for a good fifteen minutes. Cop said that happens all the time. I'll probably never ride at dusk in October again... | ||
| Saratoga |
Hit a dead cat with my old 04 mean streak that was in the middle of the lane at night... didn't see it until the car in front of me passed it and then it was too late. The bike jumped, I shat myself, and nothing happened. No jerking of the bars, etc. That was a heavy ass bike too. | ||
| Swordsman |
How does a squirrel cause a tank slapper on an 800 lb bike...? I would have expected more of a "bump!" ~SM | ||
| Spiderman |
http://www.vtwinmama.com/demonic_squirrel_riding_s tory.htm game, set, match... | ||
| Srwitt |
Yesterday morning, I almost hit a big porcupine. This morning, about 1/8th mile from where I almost hit it, lay either it or one of its friends dead in the middle of my lane, mid corner blind to me at tip in, that was fun to avoid. A couple years ago on my old Bamdit 400 I was on my way to work. Its about 630 in the AM, and I'm cruising along at about 65. I get to this stretch of road that drops into a valley about 3/4 of a mile long, you can see all the way across the valley and good visuals to the sides of the road. I can't resist, I looked down, checked my speed/tach, downshifted and pinned the throttle, as I looked up there was a small deer in the middle of the road staring at me. By this time I'm doing 80+, and decide he's going to run back the way he came, so I swerve to the right, well he kept going, and I ended up putting my left hand/clip-on straight into the side of the deers skull, causing the deer to fall down into the radiator, which spun him around allowing him to kick my left knee before he finally spun off the back end of the bike, leaving me in a tank slapper at 80'ish. Well I rode it out, looked back made sure the carcass was off the road and continued the last 7 miles to work without a functioning clutch hand, it was already too swollen, and a hurting left knee. I ran all stops between there and work, after looking of course. Later that day I went back and found the body, he was missing one spike, and had a pretty nice indent in his skull, needless to say he didn't make it more than 100ft from the point of impact. Total damage to the Bandit, a broken turn signal, and a bent up radiator, it still ran fine for the ride home, that is until the fuel filter plugged up do to some suddenly jarred loose rust in the tank. So I hit a deer, and hoofed it through the middle of BFE all in one day. | ||
| Zatco81 |
game, set, match... Great story but one question. How often do you frequent V-Twin Mama.com? | ||
| Spiderman |
I just googled the story and that was the first site... | ||
| Vtpeg |
http://www.moosefund.org/ManVersusMoose.html This guy is still riding in VT | ||
| Brandon_m |
I caught a bird in May on my way to the SBK in Salt Lake. Glad it hit the fairing and not me. Could have been pretty bad. My buddy had to pull off the road to keep from falling off his bike due to laughter. Damn birds... | ||
| No_rice |
i caught a red winged blackbird at 160/170 years ago. while the kid that was buying my bike was on his way to pick it up. thought i needed one last blast on my bike before it was gone. tore a hole right through the windscreen and put a few holes in me. the (now ex) wife turned ghost white when i showed up back home a few minutes later covered in blood and guts from the waist up. that thing just exploded. pretty sure the beak is probably what put a cut from my nose to my ear(young and dumb and no helmet... i know i know) the only signs that it was a bird were a few feathers and his feet sticking out of what was left of the front end of my bike. | ||
| Niceguyeddy |
Two birds, one in the left foot(not bad for me...) One on the right knee at about 75mph. That one hurt. Almost nailed a Turkey Buzzard riding along the Mississippi in Iowa. Too many deer dodgings to mention here. For many years I lived with-in a game refuge. My wife always says "Slow and steady wins the race...". Guess I'm a slow learner. | ||
| Dsword |
Now THAT is a funny story. I can see the feet hangin out. | ||
| Terrys |
Black bird went right into my front spokes. And I hit a Canadian Goose with my head!! gone about 45 | ||
| Lv_ss |
I didn't hit it, but a turkey buzzard and i had a race race a few weeks back. After about a hundred feet or so he finally decided to veer in a different direction. I never saw one so up close and personal before. And I really hope not to ever again. (Message edited by lv_ss on July 04, 2009) | ||
| Barnyard |
I was driving to work and hit a skunk. man that is the worse thing to hit. i had to wash my bike 3 times and leave it out side for a week | ||
| No_rice |
sooo.... i hadnt thought about hitting that blackbird for years. and now that i did guess what happened on the way to work this morning... and not just once... this one had to try hard to catch what little bit of front fairing i have on my 9. and then skip up and skim the side of my helmet. was only doing 65-70 for that.  obviously i stopped and had a look at it and checked the front of the bike. then took off again since i needed to get to work. now that i had messed around i kicked it up a notch to make up some time on the backroads on my way to work. no more than a couple miles later i caught another bird. not even sure what this one was. caught him in the shin at a little over 100. feathers and blood all over my leg and a few reminants stuck to the bike lol.  i think they were after me this morning... | ||
| Brandon_m |
That's it... I'm calling PETA. You know, I was talking about this to a friend and he claims "it can't hurt, it's just a bird." I think the bird I hit weighed a little more than a baseball. So tonight I'm taking him to the batting cages. Since they both weigh the same, a baseball at 70 mph shouldn't hurt either, right? | ||
| Miko_k |
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gqRXzE2Ors | ||
| Frosty |
I jumped a deer carcass 2 years ago on my Blast |
