Swerving around a stopped truck was bad enough, but to almost smoke a red light runner brings dodging Idiots In Cars to a whole other level.
Presumed Minneapolis resident and Redditor /u/CorbinatorZ posted up dashcam footage from yesterday (Dec. 18, 2023) showing the teeth clenching moment he swerved around a driver stopped at an intersection on his phone and avoided T-boning a red light runner in back-to-back incidents.
Check out the NSFW (language) dashcam footage for yourself below.
Went around one idiot on their phone and almost smoked another. [OC] [NSFW: Language]
byu/CorbinatorZ inIdiotsInCars
The incident happened at the intersection of NE Main St. And 1st Ave NE in Minneapolis, MN (Exact location on Google Maps linked here.)
In his dashcam footage, we can see OP driving along near the 100 block of 1st Ave NE.
The intersection lights coming up are clearly showing green, giving OP the right of way.
Despite having a green light, he comes up behind an oblivious driver in a silver Toyota Tacoma who’s stopped, presumably on their cellphone.
OP changes lane, enters the intersection, and immediately hits the brakes to avoid T-boning a red light-running driver in a blue Nissan Sentra.
“Holy s*** dude. My f***ing G*d,” OP exclaims, and rightfully so.
“Two weirdos back to back like this would have me questioning reality the rest of the drive,” /u/YallWasHavingWaffles commented.
“Bad place to run a red light with that building blocking views. You are both lucky for sure,”/u/StevenG2757 replied.
Those in the thread supported OP’s assumption that the Tacoma driver was probably on their phone with some disturbing observations of their own.
“My office window looks out over an intersection where two 3-lane roads cross. I can see right into the windows laterally of every car,” /u/DigNitty commented.
“MOST people are using their phone in some capacity. Sometimes I just stand there and watch while drinking my coffee. I used to count them to get percentages of who is and isn’t using their phone, but I stopped because it’s just pretty much 2/3.”
“It used to be just teens who were supposedly on their phones texting and driving, but now it’s just everyone. Adults at times seem worse than their kids. Something needs to be done,” /u/6786_007
As for that red light runner, I’ll chalk that up to a case of just not paying attention.
As with most blog posts about near misses like this, this incident is a clear of example of two of the most important things you can do behind the wheel: to pay attention at all times and drive defensively and to get yourself a dashcam.
