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Would you drive a Road of Death?
by Amanda Arnold | November 12, 2009

A van descends past a series of crosses marking the site of fatal accidents on the most dangerous road in the world -- Old Yungas. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
Three words you don’t want to hear when you get into the car with someone: “You will die.”
For one thing, if you’re on Bolivia’s “Road of Death,” they’re just redundant. For another, they’re plausible. According to writer Michael Whitaker (whose driver on the Road of Death spoke these three magic words to him “loudly, eerily and in perfect English” while another motorist passed the vehicle), 200 to 300 people die each year on the North Yungas Road that runs from the Amazon forest to Bolivia’s capital of La Paz.
Why? Because it’s a two-lane road that’s only 10.5 feet wide. And though it winds along cliffs that drop off into canyons half a mile deep, it has no guard rail. Also, it’s not paved the whole way. So during the rainy season, the muddy road melts, and cars that stall or stop to wait out the rain get washed down the Andes Mountains. According to Whitaker, some of the drivers on the road chew coca leaves to stay awake while they put the pedal to the metal. Not the safest of conditions.
Nevertheless, as you might not imagine, the Road of Death attracts tourists, and more specifically, cyclists. Mountain bikers looking for a really steep, long downhill stretch think the Road of Death is the bee’s knees. It drops 11,800 feet in just 40 miles, according to The Times of London, and 25,000 cyclists hoping to take in some gorgeous Andes views bike the road. But it really is a dangerous trek. Just to give one example — in 2008, some cyclists collided with a Toyota Land Cruiser, which tumbled down an embankment. One cyclist and eight passengers in the vehicle were killed.
As dangerous roads go, the North Yungas Road tops most lists. Would you be brave enough to drive a road that kills people?
For more dangerous stuff…
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There’s a fine line between “brave” and “stupid”, and driving this road just for fun seems to be nowhere near the line. I wonder why people still do that…
I wonder what the survival rate of this road is; that is, what is the ratio of the number of successful road drives to the number of lethal drives on the road? I think that would be a useful and extremely interesting statistic.
Someone ought to be able to make a business hauling scrap metal out of the valley and selling it. Hey, why not?
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Why don’t the respective authorities do something about it?
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[...] and think about something else for a while (like, perhaps, how to not die while you drive the Road of Death), those boring old solutions fall away, opening the door for fresh [...]
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The new road has been finished for about a year, now. Many vehicles do not use it because it costs more.
There are many specialist biking companies with $2000+ bikes and guides and the vast majority finish with no problems whatsoever and an amazing life enhancing exhilarating experience.
Yeah,,,it is dangerous–accidents do happen–so what? No one lives forever.
In Bolivia, one is free to do what one wants as long as no one else is hurt by it. One has to watch out for one’s self, and I see that as a good thing–as opposed to the current US ‘mommy state’–which raises people with no common sense at all. Want to walk up to the edge of a 800′ drop-off? Go for it, but if you fall, it is your own fault, and that is just the way it should be, I believe.
It makes Costa Rica look like Miami beach, and that is part of its allure–an incredible step back in time to in many ways what our future in the developed world is about to become. Their three main abiding principles are: don’t steal, don’t lie and be productive. I’d add a forth–don’t be critical–the people are doing the best they can with what they’ve got. In more ways than I can name, it is one of the most amazing countries on earth.
Regards,,,locoto
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