<Mike>
Paddy and Mick - were the names changed to protect the . . . innocent?
That was one severely stuffed VW. I was already wondering if the telegraph pole provided a take-off ramp before I read your thoughts along the same lines - why are you unconvinced that is a plausible explanation?
The Garda sound somewhat better than the alleged upholders of the law provided by both Thames Valley and the Manx Constabulary.
As I've only just got back from the Isle of Man (Having missed the last two years. Aarrrgggghhhhh!) I'll start with the Manx Constabulary.
Not this year - 2008? - we were going down Bray Hill when the sound of two-tones made me look in the mirror to see blue lights a fraction of a second before a police bike went by at high speed. 200 yards later, as we ascended Ago's Leap, the process was repeated. Another 200 yards further on, as we descended towards Quarter Bridge, a police car took over the role. While we queued to turn right at Quarter Bridge two more police cars came screaming through from the direction of their HQ a few hundred yards to our left.
By then I was convinced there had been a major incident of some sort, particularly when two more came howling by on the straight between Quarter and Braddan Bridges. Had a plane crashed coming into Ronaldsway, I wondered as I was passed by another one between Braddan Bridge and Union Mills and two more between Union Mills and Glen Vine. Surely nothing else could explain a police response of that magnitude?
Then I crested the hump that follows Glen Vine and found the dip through Crosby village filled from wall to wall with this vast sea of flashing blue lights.
All traffic was diverted around Crosby and when we finally made it back onto the Douglas to Peel road on the other side of Crosby there were yet more Police vehicles almost tailgating each other as they "headed towards" at high speed from the Peel direction.
It turned out a car driver hadn't bothered to either indicate or look in his mirror before turning right, taking out a motorcyclist who'd been overtaking him. The biker was killed, but even so . . .
That happen during practice week. About ten days later, towards the end of race week, we were sat in a Douglas pub, unobtrusively eavesdropping the conversation at the next table as a bemused thirty-something told his parents about what was clearly an extremely minor bump that he'd had on his drive to work that morning. "The entire Manx police force turned up" he told them with an incredulous shake of his head.
As Irene remarked later as we walked back to our hotel "If you want to rob a bank in Douglas, stage a road accident in Ramsey".
And as for Thames Valley Police!
To give you just one of many possible examples, a couple of years ago a mouthy chav in a flashy sports car ran up the back of a young couple right outside my house. It was very quickly established that the mouthy chav was not insured, whereupon the local Rozzers were called.
Ten minutes after their arrival the chav was sent on his way, laughing his head off, while the Plod proceeded to give the young couple an extremely hard time that went on for quite a while.
I later learned that the mouthy chav is one of the areas more prominent drug dealers. It's hard to prevent the word "corruption" coming to mind . . .
</Mike>
<Jeff>
I have two events which build into your senerio ...one Sunday lunchtime we were crossing over to the valley to the west. The road here is fast and was unrestircted. It had one junction on it and at ~ 1pm on a Sunday the junction had a car on it's roof with all 4 doors open and no one inside or in sight....we guess someone had a pint or two before lunch and was late for his dinner...put the car on it's roof ....did a runner and was going to report his car stolen later in the day. Two..... a mate of mind was returning for Xmas from his first part of officier training with the RAF. On ice he managed to slide the car sideways through a telegraph pole ..the VW Golf was writen but he was amused that the insurance company paid the bt bill for the repair. The bill included the itemised "credit "of money from selling remains of telegraph pole.... 65p!!. My mate's father had been a recon Spitfire pilot during WWII and had finished the RAF as an instructor at RAF thorney island..unfortunately my mate hurt his ribs while doing his pole smashing activity and the RAF wanted to re-course him when he failed the next part of the course. Chris didn't agree with them and he and the RAF parted. About 4-5 years ago I heard of a robot solar plane made by DERA at Farnborough .....and who was the lead engineer on the project...my pole smashing mate CK
</Jeff>
I have two events which build into your senerio ...one Sunday lunchtime we were crossing over to the valley to the west. The road here is fast and was unrestircted. It had one junction on it and at ~ 1pm on a Sunday the junction had a car on it's roof with all 4 doors open and no one inside or in sight....we guess someone had a pint or two before lunch and was late for his dinner...put the car on it's roof ....did a runner and was going to report his car stolen later in the day. Two..... a mate of mind was returning for Xmas from his first part of officier training with the RAF. On ice he managed to slide the car sideways through a telegraph pole ..the VW Golf was writen but he was amused that the insurance company paid the bt bill for the repair. The bill included the itemised "credit "of money from selling remains of telegraph pole.... 65p!!. My mate's father had been a recon Spitfire pilot during WWII and had finished the RAF as an instructor at RAF thorney island..unfortunately my mate hurt his ribs while doing his pole smashing activity and the RAF wanted to re-course him when he failed the next part of the course. Chris didn't agree with them and he and the RAF parted. About 4-5 years ago I heard of a robot solar plane made by DERA at Farnborough .....and who was the lead engineer on the project...my pole smashing mate CK
</Jeff>
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