Pothole on a sharp Bend

by cswminty

12 Jan 2011

It was 17:30 in the evening, it was very dark and the country roads were not lit by any street lights or other artificial light, just my car headlights. As i was heading out of Polesworth, passing under the M42 bridge, i drove up a slight incline in the road and was approaching a tight left hand bend when to my surprise, my alloy wheel dropped into the unmarked pothole which was hidden by the darkness of the night. The wheel struck the edge of the pothole which is where the damage occured.

As there was a fatal car accident at this bend in 2007, I always take good care and attention when approaching the bend and check my speed and approach with caution.

I was approaching the bend I drove over a very severe pothole on the left hand side of the road and in the process badly damaged my nearside front alloy wheel, leaving my vehicle un-drivable due to the damage to the alloy wheel. The sudden impact of the pothole against the alloy wheel has caused the edge of the alloy wheel to fold outwards leaving the alloy wheel unfit to drive-on and un-repairable due to the construction of an alloy wheel. The pothole is in a very dangerous location, immediatly before the sharp bend that i have previously mentioned.

After the impact of the wheel and the pothole my vehicle felt as though it pulled slightly to the left and there was some wheel wobble that i could feel through the steering wheel, similar to that which you can feel when a wheel is not balanced correctly. I drove very slowly to my friends house, where i was heading and inspected the damage to the alloy wheel. I returned to the scene of the incident the following morning to inspect the pothole in daylight when it was safe to observe the damaged road.

I have photographed the damage to my alloy wheel, the potholes in the road and have also obtained images from Google Maps & Google Earth to show the location of the road and the described potholes on the unnamed road.