Monday, July 21, 2008

That Happened


Yup. It happened. Nobody was hurt and by all accounts the damage was surprisingly little. Quite an "oh shit" moment though.

More from the Gorge coming soon :)

10 comments:

James Douglass said...

How'd it break? How'd you fix it? How's the Gorge?

Mo said...

That's taking your "catapult" theme to the extreme...eh?

;)

Andy said...

What does carbon sound like as it slides across the rumble strips?

Yikes, man!!

scooper said...

I've lost gear off of the roof rack more than once. I know exactly how that, "Oh Shit!" moment feels. I never did find the mini Bic that blew off of the rack when we were crossing the bridge to the mainland from PEI Canada. At least it was on the way home from our vacation.

George Markopoulos said...

Someone out here lost board off the roof while traveling over the chesapeake bay bridge. this was years ago. the board ultimately washed ashore down in kent island a few days later, and was ultimately returned to the owner. I believe the bridge is 186 tall high at it highest point.

PeconicPuffin said...

Oh man. How are the boards? Hey are those both Fanatic FreeWaves? I have (and love) the 77.

Waterturtle said...

Aaron, tell us the story. What made the racks come off like that? High wind? Not screwed down tight enough? cracked part gave way?

Mo said...

Poor Aaron, forlorn and rackless, did a drive-by at Coyote today.
Poor, poor pitiful he.

:(

mkollac said...

I feel like I don't really belong here, since I don't know you guys at all...but I feel that my rack story sort of includes me in the group. My friend and I lost 2 pairs of skis off of our roof racka few years back. Just as we passed a car the racks opened and skis got airborne! Fortunately the car we had just passed did not run over them (I have no idea how), and our skis were in surprisingly good shape afterwards. Glad it didn't break your stuff too badly.

Catapulting Aaron said...

Mac,

I think it was a combination of effects that made the rack come off. It had been slipping on the way up, but when we were in the gorge, we managed to get the rack to survive 40mph headwinds. We assumed that everything was going to be fine. One of the things I think contributed to the failure is that it was really hot on the way home and the rubber contact points had gotten a little "melty". Anyway the amazing thing was the rack flying from the right lane that we were driving in into the left median. We got really lucky overall.

I love my matrix, but the curved roof is the downfall. It does not have a good place to mount a rack.

Michael, one was a 77 and one was an 86. They are definitely cherry boards.

Matej, welcome to the blogosphere. Definitely comment, the more the merrier... Glad to hear your ski stuff was ok... Someone told me a story where their ski gear fell off in a bad place and they just left it behind, HA!