SHE SAYS...

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33128, 19 January 1973, Page 6

SHE SAYS...

Driving about Christchurch, I find myself increasingly frightened by the number of large trucks with obviously highly insecure loads—as the legal expression is, I believe—teetering about on their decks. It is bad enough when you are driving. But it is no happier a situation if you are a pedestrian, waiting to cross the road with parcels and infants, when one of these dangerouslooking monsters snorts past with a bale, crate, or drum hanging over you like the sword of Damocles. If you are driving behind one of these vehicles, it is up to you to drop back out of harm’s way. But if you are coming the other way, or the thing is turning right in front of you, there is not much you can do but hope and pray. It would be comforting to think that the situation is not as bad' as it looks, but I have noticed a lot of instances mentioned in the newspapers during the last few months of vehicles losing their loads. Most of the frightening cases I have seen of dan-

gerous loads have been on the vehicles of commercial firms. This includes two instances where an overloaded gravel truck was dropping a steady rain of stones on the roadway. The gravel was bouncing all over the place, and with a lot of force, and how a car coming the other way did not lose a windscreen I don’t know — maybe one did, and I did not see it. We dropped a long way behind the truck—it was on the open road—but even 100 yards behind it, stones were skittering along at headlamp height. If I had seen a traffic officer, I would have stopped to complain. I did not, of course. They appear only when not wanted! I have seen cases of private drivers with dangerous, loads as well, though—the week-end trailer experts, with mowers, concrete mixers, and other substantial objects in constant danger of sliding on to the road, or some hapless bystander. I predict that a loose load will cause a serious, accident in Christchurch before this year is out.