On two occasions I have been in the vehicle when an individual has fallen out of a moving car. Obviously not something to be taken lightly. The first incident was when I was very young and was in fact the one making the unscheduled exit. I think I was perhaps eight or nine, therefore in about 1950/51 give or take. Playing with a wind-up toy, I had somehow wound up the toy and, no pun is intended, wound up (English can be trying at times) with a fairly significant piece of the toy’s powerful spring buried deep inside my hand and part of a finger. The spring had broken in two with considerable force. With zero experience removing springs or anything else metallic or otherwise from within a child, my parents took me to the one and only hospital in town, the North Lonsdale. (1866-1990!) This for the 60,000 or so people in our working class shipyard-centric north of England town Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria.
Actually if truth be told, Barrow or ‘Barra’ as we pronounced it, was then in North Lancashire. How and why they ‘moved’ it into Cumbria (formerly Cumberland go figure) has always been a mystery to me. Incidentally and for what it’s worth, that ‘yard’, now the biggest in Britain and owned by CAE, is currently building and has built multiple of over the years, Britain’s latest nuclear submarine. To hide them from prying satellite mounted ultra high resolution cameras, the subs are built inside an incredibly large building. They are invariably delivered either four years late and two billion pounds over budget or two years late and four billion pounds over budget. Ask any passing Barrovian. Enquire also about the world class Dock Museum – Wednesdays through Sundays. Living in Canada since 1967, the one opportunity I have since had to visit the museum fell on a Tuesday!
My parents had an aged four seater utilitarian to say the least two door car of sorts, a 1939 Morris 8. Inexplicably, the two doors were of what came to be known in the general case as suicide doors and for good reason. They were attached to the car body the ‘wrong way around’. They were hinged at the rear edge of the door not the forward one as eventually became standard. Thus when moving, if opened they were immediately hit full on by the slipstream. Thus they were prone to being wrenched out of one’s hands in an instant even at slow speeds let alone during highway cruising speed accidents. (Not that speeds were ever very high in a marginally viable 1939 Morris 8! ) Since this was long before the advent of seat belts, front seat passengers not infrequently followed the door on it’s outbound trajectory.
Fortunately the hospital was not far away as blood was spurting from the wound in spite of a rudimentary bandage that had hurriedly been applied. Seated in the front passenger seat i.e. on the left as cars were right hand drive this being England, I started to open the door with my uninjured hand as my father, since few women drove in those unenlightened and chauvinistic times and my mother not being one of them, pulled into the hospital parking lot slowing to a crawl as we approached the main entrance. Just as I went to exit and step onto the sidewalk my father, presumably not realising I had unlatched the door, suddenly and with uncannily exquisite timing, made a sudden and very sharp right turn and accelerated away about as well as the old ‘jalopy’ was capable of. Following the by then wide open door, I was instantly ejected on to the sidewalk by the centrifugal force generated by the quick right turn. Do not try this at home.
My father for reasons unknown had decided at more or less the last second, to park somewhere else in the parking lot. At least that was his story. Luckily I was uninjured save for a few scrapes and the hospital staff made short work of removing the offending spring. I joined my mother and sat in the back seat for the return trip!
The second time I was in a car when an individual fell from it was just a few years ago and was much more serious. For starters, I was the driver. The car was my much loved black two seater 2003 BMW Z4 convertible sports car which I still have and in mint condition. I bought it from a BMW dealership as a four year old vehicle with only 14,000 kms on it. Apparently the original owner had traded in his three! BMWs and bought two new ones. I guess he was downsizing which was an idiosyncratic move popular at the time. Likely perhaps a ‘belt tightening’ measure to ensure continuance of the family fortune. I remember the salesman saying “I know it’s a cliche sir, but this one won’t last we never get four year old cars with only 14,000 kilometers on them”. He also mentioned that there were two years left on a six year warranty. I was an easy ‘mark’.
Driving around our renowned 1,000 acres (405 hectares) Stanley Park here in Vancouver, BC one warm and sunny summer afternoon with the convertible top and the windows down, I was en-route to a restaurant where I had a dinner reservation. With me was a friend whose birthday we were celebrating. The road is one way and the speed limit, rightly, is a very low 30 kph or about 20 mph if you will.
Circumnavigating the park, the route is used by an eclectic public mix involving autos, tour buses, horse drawn carriages, bicycles, tricycles, (regular and recumbent), motorcycles, unicycles, scooters of various stripes, pedestrians, rollerbladers (who like pedestrians and unicyclists, should be on the sidewalk but often aren’t) and the latest generation of personal electric powered gismos. All these along with raccoons, coyotes, Canada geese and myriad grey squirrels most of them black. (Don’t ask).
About half way around the seven kilometre loop road we came upon some roadworks. Starting just prior to reaching them the presumably aging and cracked pavement had been removed. The surface became very rough indeed. Off-road is not the forte of the Austin Healy 3000 like ground hugging firmly suspended three litre in-line six equipped, high performing Z4. I slowed to what I thought was an appropriate crawl of about 5 km/hr and bounced my way towards a long and gradually bending part of the road that was not under repair. At that location there is a spectacular look-out over the pacific ocean/salish sea along with other tourist trap must patronize attractions including food, beer and wine. (and often begging raccoons disguised as bandits).
As I gingerly rounded the bend and just before I was back on pavement, I couldn’t help noticing that my passenger was no longer in the seat nor the car! Yet the passenger door was closed. I was struggling with processing this information when I suddenly heard, in a voice as clear and calm as they get saying “I’ve fallen out of the car, I’ve fallen out of the car”. To no surprise, it came from behind and from the passenger side of the car. A bit of a dead give away. Again the voice came. “I’ve fallen out of the car, I’ve fallen out of the car”.
Gathering what was left of my by then hyper-disturbed wits, I quickly stopped the car anxious to retrieve my AWAL passenger. “I’ve fallen out of the car” sounded again however the words were I realised being directed at a concerned tourist who was running towards a position astern of the car.
I beat the tourist to the mark by ‘a short head’ as they say in the horse racing game. My erstwhile passenger appeared to be relatively unharmed except for small amounts of blood slowly oozing from numerous cuts and scrapes. Before I could open my mouth to say “what happened?” my friend quickly went to the car and climbed in almost as though nothing had happened.
Not wishing to engage with the tourist and the many other gawkers by then rapidly assembling we took off. How did you manage to fall out I asked? The last time I had looked the passenger seat had been fully occupied. Like myself a consummate and enthusiastic thespian (we are both members of a theatre group) given the fairly numerous photo and video shooting tourists extant and the by then very slow moving well polished and ’showy’ sports car, my dear friend had seen an opportunity to invite, engage, amuse and entertain, guess what – a ready audience! As in why not stand up on the passenger seat and wave to the crowd. Make like a celebrity. Why not indeed? Standing on the seat coupled with a poor grip on the windshield, the window down and a significant bump in the under repair pot holed road and bingo – passenger overboard so to speak.
With my friend safely buckled up again we discussed our next move. Cancel dinner I suggested? No way no dice. The show as it were we both agreed, must go on. We parked at the restaurant, some minor costume adjustments were implemented and in we went hoping nobody would notice the blood stains, various large and small clothing rips or our forced theatrical nonchalance given our all too apparent overall discombobulation, dishevelment and adrenalin enhanced disposition. The meal was great and the wine excellent. Notwithstanding that I had to drive (this time with the top down and the windows up, I wasn’t taking any chances) we counted our collective lucky stars and rang the curtain down. All’s well that ends well.
Not remotely in the same dramatic league and also in the Z4, alone this time and again with both the top and the windows down, I was driving on Beach avenue in Vancouver, a spectacular English Bay waterfront road when I suddenly found myself passing crowds of people lining each side of the road. Very uncharacteristically for the route, there was no traffic ahead of me nor upon looking in the mirror, was there any behind. The crowds were swelling in number even as I drove. The penny dropped. I was inadvertently on the annual Vancouver Gay Pride parade route scheduled for that day. Quite how this happened I will never know. I like to think I was the last car allowed through before they closed the route for the parade. Hopefully that was the case – or did I miss or ignore a sign? Perhaps.
Turning around was out of the question. Obviously the parade was very likely by then under way. With the ocean on one side I couldn’t turn off to the left. To the right even at intersections the milling throngs would prevented a swift exit stage right. I decided to play the part. I took off my sunhat and waved it to the onlookers who were it turned out more than happy to cheer and wave back! I wondered if the police would be waiting for me at the end of the route. Luckily the word that some star struck thespiatic idiot had assumed the role of Gay Pride parade leader by hijacking the parade master position had not yet reached the local constabulary! The crowds thinned towards the end of the route. At the first opportunity I slunk off making a clean getaway.