.jpg)
.jpg)
VIDEO: "He forced me off the road" - Watch Forest Reefs woman's terrifying dashcam footage
June 18, 2022
By Peter Holmes
“I assumed he would pop out, see me coming and go back again, but he didn't. He just came out, kept overtaking and he just kept coming.”
Emma Dauvin from Forest Reefs was driving to university in Bathurst early on Friday morning in her husband Paul's car. She was the only one in the vehicle.
Around Dunkeld, on a straight stretch of road with white dividing lines, a sedan coming the other way was sitting behind a truck.
All three vehicles had their headlights on.
Dashcam footage from Paul Dauvin’s car provided to The Orange News Examiner shows the sedan pulling out from behind the truck, and instead of ducking back behind the truck, driving instead straight towards his wife Emma.
“By the time he had almost got to me, my brain kicked in and told me to get out of the way,” Emma said in an interview on Saturday.
“He was basically up beside the truck and he forced me off the road.”
Fortunately for Emma there were no safety rails on that stretch of road and she was able to brake, swerve left and return to the highway.
“[Swerving off the road] was more of an afterthought,” she said.
“It took me a few seconds to react at all; I saw him coming and it was like I was trying to convince myself it wasn’t happening, like ‘No, no, he’ll get back over into his lane, he’ll realise I'm here and he’ll move’, but he didn't, he just kept coming. At the last second I jerked my car off the road.
“I’m quite good under pressure and I think that’s why I stayed in my lane so long.”
A mother of three, Emma said the other vehicle missed the back of her car “by maybe a few inches”.
MORE NEWS: As winter sets in, reality bites for Orange students, pensioners, unemployed and working poor
“I looked at my side window and saw him slide straight past my car.
“It was pretty terrifying. It wasn't until after that I realised that I didn't know what I was swerving into. I was incredibly lucky there was room, it was a level, flat piece of land.
“Maybe 200 metres further up there was steel guard rail [and] if I'd been caught there I'd have had nowhere to go.”
The word that flew from Emma’s mouth immediately after the incident began with the sixth letter of the alphabet.
“It was incredibly lucky that there were no cars behind me - if someone was behind me they would have copped a head-on. Everything in my life fell into place yesterday and got me out of that.”
Asked if she was a religious person, she joked "I am now! ... I definitely think someone was watching over me.”
With adrenaline coursing through her system Emma rang Paul, who spoke to her for the rest of the trip into Bathurst.
"I felt like I needed somebody to talk to me the whole way," she said.
"I felt a bit light-headed, as if my body was starting to re-regulate itself after the shock. My heart was racing. When I pulled up at uni and hopped out I held my hand out in front of me. I definitely had the shakes."
WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT
As newsrooms are gutted and fake news floods the zone, a free and independent news service is more crucial than ever. Producing news that informs, digs deeper, holds power to account and looks beyond the press release is time consuming.
If you're one of the 14,000+ people who read stories each month at The Orange News Examiner, please consider becoming a pioneer supporter at our new Patreon page.
Your contribution can help ensure everyone can read our stories, no matter their income or means. Thank you!
コメント