I was thinking about the times I've had catastrophic (as opposed to slow) punctures, and it's not that many in 40 years of car ownership.
- Late 1980s, somewhere in France, on a motorway, with my mother in the car. Don't know what caused it. I got under the canopy of an unmanned petrol station just as a thunderstorm began. I was entirely confident of my ability to change the wheel and impress my mother with my competence. However, as I began, an English man who had called in for petrol saw what was happening, came over, and did the job. I was slightly deflated (like the tyre), but accepted gracefully.
- Early 1990s, near Heathrow airport. I hit a kerb. Silly me. I started to change the tyre but couldn't shift the wheel nuts. I happened to be right outside a pub. I went in and asked the general atmosphere if anyone could loosen a wheel nut for me. Of course about five men leaped up and did the entire job. They had no trouble with the wheel nuts.
- About 2008, hit a bad pothole in the Peugeot on the way to the dentist. The actual alloy was bent. I didn't fancy my chances on that fast road, which was quite busy, and phoned the RAC. Eventually a patrolman came and changed the wheel. While I was waiting a council works van stopped and the workmen asked if they could help. I said it was OK, I was waiting for the RAC. They said they were on their way to fix the pothole!
- About 2021, flat that I ran on for some time without realising. When I stopped, in a village near here, someone told me I was right outside a workshop. The guy in the workshop tried to inflate the tyre with his air line, but when he realised it was hopeless he put the space saver on for me.
So not that many punctures, and
every single time a knight in shining armour (otherwise known as a normal man) either changed the wheel for me or at least offered to. This time, of course, I was hampered by not having a spare. It's absolutely insane not to supply one. But then again, the perfect record of knights in shining armour was maintained, by the holidaymaker who came out with tea and biscuits and eventually got my phone working, and by the taxi driver who found me at three in the morning despite the car being wrongly described to him. Let's hear it for the male of the species.
It's a funny thing, but I can't shake the guilty feeling that this puncture was my own fault, that started the minute I realised the tyre was flat. I was on a tarred public road. I wasn't going fast, and I wasn't close to the side of the road. I wasn't squeezing past another car, I had the road to myself. It was just a stone. But somehow, I'm to blame! I suppose it's the feeling that it serves me right for going joyriding on such a minor road. Loads of cars and vans were passing without incident. As I began to negotiate the pass, two classic open-top sports cars passed me in the opposite direction, having just completed it. But the holidaymaker said the farmer is so hacked off because he gets about two people a week looking for help in the high season. So it is a risky place to go.
