Yes, we crashed the Ferret! In true Douglas Adams style, in order to avoid any stress and nervous tension I can tell you that both of us are OK, apart from one of us getting a thorn stuck in their finger while climbing back up the bank, and the Ferret is now back home in the garage and working OK, although I will check it over very thoroughly to find out what happened and make sure it doesn't happen again.
It's a bit hard to tell from the video with the recorder's image stabilisation but we were travelling along at 20 mph when the front of the Ferret bounced a couple of times and then the front right wheel locked up (which also locks up the rear right wheel as they are connected), and we were dragged off the road to the right and slid about 50 feet down the bank, stopping about 6 feet from the river. We might have been able to reverse out, but just as it came to a stop it slid sideways and ended up at 45 degrees sitting on a rock with both left wheels off the ground and a tree behind us.
We walked to the Wasdale Head Inn where they were very helpful and let us use their phone as there's no mobile phone signal in the Wasdale valley. We also had a pint of Guinness each to steady our nerves.
Taxi home that night as no recovery vehicles available, then back the next day with two recovery trucks, it took 2 winches to get it back up and we blocked the road for about 2.5 hours, but everyone we held up was very understanding, luckily. M6 Recovery Services, highly recommended.
We think we were very lucky - if it had happened earlier we could have ended up in England's deepest lake, Wastwater, and any later we could have rolled down the bank as it's steeper, which would have done a lot more damage to us and the Ferret. If we were in a normal car we'd have rolled and completely trashed it and ourselves. We may have to apologise to the National Trust for destroying a few of their trees on the way down.
In order that some sense of mystery should be preserved I won't reveal which of us sustained the finger damage... you'll have to watch the video.
Негізгі бет We crashed our 1959 Daimler Ferret 4 ton armoured car! Read the description first.
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