UGHHHHHH-
Headed up I-5 yesterday on the way home from LA we hit some incredible weather! Around Bakersfield (for about 30 miles) we were in the worst dust storm I've ever seen. Visibility was terrible! And the tumbleweeds were everywhere. I did a good job of avoiding the buggers, but then it happened. It appeared all of a sudden from nowhere, it was the godzilla of tumbleweeds.

I had a split second to decide what to do. With the road being wet I figured best not to try and swerve around it. So center-punch the sucker was the only option.

The monster was at least 2' wider than the car on either side, and the center of the thing was a little over the height of the roof of the car. I've never seen anything like this and crap - I'm driving through it! So at the next exit we stopped at a gas station to inspect the damamge and pluck all the debris from the car. Sticks everywhere! In the windshield moulding, bumper, front light assemblies, wipers - everywhere!!!

Cleaned the car up this morning and took another look. The hood is scratched up pretty good. I don't feel grooves though, so hopefully $150 at a detail shop will take care of it.

D*mn tumbleweed!!!!!

Anyone else ever encounter a monstrous weed?

 

You are lucky it was not a deer.......they do scratch the paint up a bit more.......

I remember once I was driving down the road with traffic on one side, guard rail on the other, pick up truck in front, care behind....all going lickety split....when the pickup truck looses a boxspring off its load. Like you, I had nowhere to go, so I "gripped it and ripped it"........rear mirror view looked like a freight train went through a hen house.......

Suprised the hell out of the guy behind me......... I picked feathers out of the suspension for a year......

 

Nature has interesting ways to disperse seeds............ but how could evolution have anticipated 928s?

 

Chaos theory Jim.......ever see a moose take on laundry drying in the sun? If a Moose can be a laundry dryer, why can't a 928 be a seed spreader..............

 

Beth I too experianced massive weed back in my high school days, gave me the munchies!!!!!!!!!!!

 

To he untrained eye tumbleweeds are just a ball of tiny dry branches. In reality however they have an internal guidance system to rival anything being dropped by F18 Hornets or launched from missle silos.

On my way across Texas last year I spotted one of these suckers, it was well off the highway kind of going in circles and I was doing around 85/90mph. We seemed to be each minding our own business. Then, it starts to move towards the highway and I took a quick look around me to check for evasive manuever room. No one near me, all clear. As I approached, the ball starts to gain speed and I drifted to my left as it looked like it wouldn't get much farther than the emergency lane. Having now picked up the heat signature of my engine the ball took a leap to follow. I straddled the lanes ready to go either way and the ball got radar lock on me. So I decided to definatively start drifting right while maintaining my speed and use the the two lanes plus left emergency lane for any corrections that might be necessary at 85/90mph. The ball went with me, I rev matched down to fourth, got the turbos spooled (I was in the Audi) and punched it, swinging hard left as I did so. I kid you not the ball made a last attempt at the side of the car but missed. I had two wheels over the left side yellow when it was over. I watched it in the rearview mirror and the girlfriend pipes up, "man, those things are deadly, look at that." On the other side of the highway was an oncoming Ford Crown Victoria, loaded with seniors. Dead center grill is a tumbleweed, thoroughly embedded in the front grill, top half peeping over the hood and they're just dragging it along. We started cracking up.

 

 

Exactly! It "locks" on as if the car is a big magnet or something. Reminded me of that big white ball thing from the series "The Prisoner" - it ate my car!

And I suppose I was lucky it wasn't a deer or a boxspring!

 

Someone say monstrous weed?

 

DAMN Beth ... that could easily have been a monster truck sideways after a good desert stomp .... If I saw anything that big I think I'd likely nail the brakes. Sorry to hear about your scratches. Polish can do wonders though. How did I not see you this weekend??

 

She was there... for a few minutes... She was feeling the draw of the mouse: " you are getting sleeepy... you will come back and buy more mouse junk..."

 

Didn't have time to hit the brakes. It was there all of a sudden. And it was everywhere! Yep, was the size of a truck. Later on (about 50 miles) there was an overturned big rig on the right side of the highway - I guess we weren't the only ones having a bad day.

Yeah, Heinrich, where were you? I was at 928 Int'l Saturday for about 2-3 hours, not a few minutes like Dave said.

My car was the really dirty black one . . . . . .

 

Beth I was there aaaalllll day ..... man I doubt anyone could have missed me, I was the loudmouth ... Sharkskin ... twas a pleasure

 

Just teasing, Beth...

Heinrich... likewise.

 

I know