Drunk driver - M4 west bound

[London Stone Paving]

I was driving down the M4 towards Newbury where I am currently residing when I noticed a car in front of me driving very erratically. Every 10 or 15 seconds he would just swerve into the hard shoulder or the middle lane.

I thought that the driver may have been in some trouble so I edged alongside him to take a look. The driver was probarbly mid sixties and he looked like he was ok so I overtook him and carrried on in my journey.

I had probarbly got a few hundred yards ahead when I took a quick look in my rear view. He was still swerving all over the place (not just small swerves but right across lanes). Cars and trucks were now swerving to avoid this guy and I was extremely concerened and did not feel like it was right just to drive off and ignore it.

Could not think of anyhting else to do so I got on the phone to the police and told them what was happening. By this point I had slowed right down to see if he was going to come off at the Newbury turn off which luckily he did. When he stopped at the lights I jumped out of my van and went to see if the guy was ok. When I got there he was clearly three sheets to the wind. Got back in the van and called the police and told them he was now heading up the A34.

Felt like a bit of a twat for shopping him but this guy was going to end up causing a proper pile up and killing some poor sods

[GB_Groundworks]

i would have done the same, fair play to you

[mickg]

ditto the man is a danger to other road users

[lutonlagerlout]

pile ups on the M4 are always bad, I have been stuck on that motorway more than any other for hours at a time
sounds like he deserves a darwin award drunk driving is stupid at any time, let alone week before xmas.
LLL

[Suggers]

Absolutely right thing - in the weird reality of all this - you may well have saved five lives in the family estate, in the opposite direction - as matey boy crossed the central res. into the oncoming. - off his rocker ?

[Suggers]

ps - the mother-in -law (who at 86 is fantastic BTW ) - has just decided to stop driving at night..... ???

[Dave_L]

I've stopped a drunk driver before, detained him until the feds arrived - you did the right thing.

He got a £1500 fine and a 3yr ban, then he croaked it.

[lutonlagerlout]

on the flip side of all this ,my mates dad got a tug for drink driving the morning after a heavy night,
he drove an 8 wheeler for a living,
he checked his insurance covered for suicide,
and then
before he went to court he hanged himself

if alcohol was found today it would be class *a* with oak leaves in the drug world
LLL

[seanandruby]

....And was he covered ??? you did the right thing, i'd of took his keys off the f****** idiot if he was that bad. i seen 4 children killed because of the same thing. I was only a kid myself and a d d ran into a lampost outside a pub my auld fella was drinking in there at the time. One of the children died in my fathers arms, i remember the crying and then the silence, it stays with you, takes some wiping off.

[Tony McC]

I had to go out yesterday morning to collect the younger daughter from her love hovel on a council sink estate about 10 miles away. The temp was -11°C and it took me nearly 30 mins to get the Shogun thawed out.

Heading down the road, I see a white Peugeot 'expert' van coming towards me and it looks as if the driver is waving to me. Who do I know with a white peugeot van?

Oh! He's not waving, he's keeping the ice from a letterbox of roughly 450mm x 300mm on the inside of his windscreen. Still don't recognise him. Who is it?

He seems to have a crick in his neck.

Oh no - my mistake, he's on the bloody mobile!!!

Un-bloody-believable!

[lutonlagerlout]

was it your son? :;):
LLL

[Dave_L]

"love hovel" I like that phrase!!!!!

[lutonlagerlout]

my auld fella although officially retired,has a second job supporting various errant sisters and nieces of mine
,and the vehicles that they fail to maintain or even put petrol in.
1 niece who shall remain anon (gabriella) left her window wipers on when parking Saturday
on Sunday she decided to thaw the car out before setting out
of course the wipers were frozen solid and she managed to burn out the wiper motors
"GRANDAD!" "quick bring your wallet"
LLL

[michaelthegardener]

Id have done the same with the drunk and as for the van ive got a citroen dispatch an its a bugger to get warm common problem aparently not that thats any reason not to wait for the dam thing to warm up people allways in a rush these days and even in the snow driveing like its any other day ive lost count of the ammount of cars ive seen with snow covering the whole of the side windows

[Big Phil]

many years ago me and a mate was driving back from town and spotted a car (xr3i) that had gone off the road and hit a tree. driver appeared pretty shaken and had a few cuts from the smashed windscreen but was ok to move. this was before mobile phones so couldn't call 999 or anything, and after he refused to go to A&E we asked him his address and offered to take him home. on the way home he admitted that he didn't want to go to A&E as he'd been on the pop, and knowing he'd been in a car crash would be in deep shit. he laughed and thanked us when we dropped him home and said he'll report the car stolen in the morning. my mate wanted to give him a bit of hiding, but instead we settled for stopping off at the police station and telling them all the details and where to find him and his motor.

thinking back, i should have let my mate give him a good hiding, ha ha.