Gravel Caution Redux

A repeat from a few years ago, with a new photo:

"Travel the gravel in a front wheel drive? (Also All Wheel Drives) Slow it down to around 40 and your little buggy will stay between the ditches much better. Go fast, look away at your phone, dodge a deer, and get out of the tracks, and suddenly you are on marbles. You let your foot off the gas and your car suddenly wants to swap ends. I have seen a few on their tops in the ditches around our place over the years, and it was always a front wheel drive. Rear wheel drive cars stabilize when you back off the gas, but with your front wheels hooked to the drive train you need to keep power on and steer back into the tracks. That is hard to do when you are skidding. Anyhow, slow down when you are on a loose surface. You will also have fewer flats, because the front wheels flip nails hiding in the gravel. At forty or below, nails have time to lay down again. Drive fifty in our neighborhood and you can expect a nail a week."

                                                                Click Photo To Enlarge.
You also have to be aware of pinch points on the backroads.  The road narrows down at culverts, and there are dropoffs like this one where drainages go under the road.  This one is a good four feet deep and it is a wonder that this car bounced through without rolling over.  The car is surely totaled, but the driver has only some minor bruising.  Shopping for a car is better than recovering in the hospital, but it is a cost that can usually be avoided by slowing down and driving a bit like an old man.  Consider what your safe speed is if you have to swerve and hit your brakes.  I still recommend forty as a limit, and I slow down more when I am in areas with deer movement.