While the overtaker might’ve had the right of way, it proved to be one of the more risky, legal overtaking maneuvers to pull.

New York commuter and Redditor /u/AskToThrowAwayX shared breathtaking dashcam footage from earlier this year from Henrietta to the /r/DashCamsGifs subreddit showing how their left turn on NY-253 caused an overtaker to veer onto the front lawn of Rush-Henrietta Senior High School to avoid T-boning OP.

Check out the dicey situation below with the original Reddit thread linked here.

As mentioned, the incident played out on the 1700 block of NY-253 just across from Rush-Henrietta Senior High School (Exact location on Google Maps linked here.)

As the dashcam footage shows, OP is driving along NY-253, a two-lane road with traffic going in opposite directions.

OP says he signals and begins to slow to turn left into Rush-Henrietta, although many Redditors point out we can’t exactly hear the signaling.

Unbeknownst to OP, a driver behind them, in a legal overtaking zone, sees OP is about to turn left, and decides to overtake going by swinging into the lane next to them and gunning it.

Their timing proves to be all wrong as they don’t anticipate OP not yielding to them.

As soon as they begin to overtake, OP starts to turn left.

Thankfully, there’s a wide-open front lawn in front of the High School and the overtaker, to avoid t-boning OP, drives onto the lawn at full speed.

OP completes their left turn into the High School, observing the overtaker re-route onto the parking lot, swing around, and back on NY-253.

While most commenters agreed what the overtaker did was unhinged and was probably driving too fast for the conditions (the posted speed limit here is 35,) several Redditors pointed out that, if OP had been hit by them, they would’ve been found at fault.

“I had an ex-cop that was doing a driving class I was in that used this exact scenario. According to him because that was a legal passing zone it was the person turning’s responsibility to make sure there was no traffic. I think it’s dumb af,” /u/Rinzetsu commented.

“You might want to sit down for this one. You’re in a passing zone and turning left – in some states, the folks behind you can pass before you complete your turn. This is the most dangerous legal maneuver I know of,” /u/TechnoBajr added.

“My friend got hit and was deemed at fault for something exactly like this because it wasn’t a solid line 😑,” /u/Vast-Combination4046 concurred.

This seems to be a case of even though you can legally overtake a soon-to-be left-turner, you probably shouldn’t as, although the law is clear you can overtake them, you have to 100 percent be sure they’ll let you.

If this situation is any indication of the average driver’s road knowledge, erring on the side of caution and slowing to let them turn first might be the wisest thing to do.