Yesterday motorists south of Quebec City witnessed a Piper PA-28 Cherokee airplane do a classic textbook descent landing squarely in the center of three westbound lanes on Highway 40.
What is curious is that the traffic surrounding the airplane continues to follow the airplane which slowly works its way to the outside lane . You can see one vehicle dodge around the airplane as it is moving, and also see that vehicles did not stop when the plane landed. As one pundit on YouTube pointed out “Good to know you can make a magnificent landing like that AND STILL get tailgated by a crappy hatchback”.
As Sgt. Helene Nepton of the Quebec Provincial Police stated “Fortunately, the aircraft landed without a collision, and then no one was injured. In fact, traffic was able to resume quickly in the area.”
Because as you know it is all about driver convenience and timeliness, even during the Covid-19 crisis.
Image:Airsoc.com
It is ALL about driver convenience and timeliness. I have noticed with fewer cars on the road in the lower mainland, the drivers are driving faster and with less care. Very dangerous for others on the roads especially pedestrians and cyclists.
Is this is a new situation that self-driving cars need to learn? 🙂 With all of Tesla’s billions of kms of data collection I wonder how many times it’s had to learn to navigate a vehicle that didn’t exist just moments ago?
My first reaction to the behaviour of the motorists was also how little they seemed to slow down and how they merrily continued after the fact. But we’re also seeing it from an angle that makes most everything look closer than it is. It could easily be considered much more dangerous to over-react and slow down too quickly on a fast moving highway. It wasn’t busy and you can bet speeds were in excess of 100 km/h. Stomping on the brakes isn’t the best reaction.
And after the fact, what is to be gained by stopping and ogling?
Gotta give the pilot top marks. I hope s/he had a plan B if the road had been too congested to pull that off.