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I guess I have a different idea of what the topic was about. Anyway...
Early in my driving life I got hit a couple of times from the rear, so I became vigilant about watching my rear view mirror, especially when things start to go sour in traffic situations.
A number of years ago I drove from Denver on my way to my home in the mountains in the springtime when storms can happen at any time and the roads can go bad instantly. There had been some wet spots on the road for the last hundred miles, but they hadn't yet turned into black ice until I made it through Frisco into Tenmile Canyon on the way to Copper Mountain. About a mile ahead I noticed a truck in the road that didn't quite look right, and as I got closer I could see that it was in the road crossing both lanes of Westbound I-70, and had spilled it's load of carpet rolls. I started tapping my brakes to see what the conditions were like, and it was getting icy and as I looked in my mirror I saw someone a few carlengths back that was gaining quickly on me. I put on my flashers and started slowing down, but the driver wasn't paying attention and kept gaining on me. By this time I was getting closer to the truck and had to start planning an escape route because as I kept glancing in the mirror, Mr Oblivious was still gaining on me, quicker now that I was slowing down. By the time he finally noticed that I was slowing down and that the road was blocked he jammed on his brakes and started sliding sideways, and then spinning, all the time still gaining on me. I finally decided that he was going to hit me and jam me into the truck, so the only thing I could do was to hit the gas hard and head for the median where the deep snow was. By doing this I was able to use my momentum to control my vehicle around the truck and keep going enough that the deep snow didn't grab me and I was able to get back on the road. I couldn't tell if Mr. Oblivious had been able to stop or had hit the truck, but I was past that and kept going. As I looked in the Eastbound lanes skier traffic that was heading back toward Denver was backed up for miles, and people were bouncing off of each other like a pinball game. But me, thanks to a completely blocked road on my side of the highway behind me, had I-70 all to myself all the way to Copper Mountain. I needed that calm to get my heart rate down.
Another time, on a similar trip, as I emerged from the Eisenhower tunnel on the West side, there was another springtime storm in progress and the roads were really bad with wet snow building up into uncontrollable slush. I wasn't going too fast, but you have to maintain some momentum in order to not get stuck in the middle of the Interstate. This is a steep section of road and as my speed started picking up I downshifted, and started kind of swimming around in the road. I started working my brakes, but every time I tapped on them they locked up and I started gaining speed. It's an extremely uncomfortable feeling when you hit the brakes and start going faster in conditions that you know are going to lead to trouble. I was just hoping that I could maintain control until I got lower on the mountain to where the snow is melting more and my tires would stop floating and get down to the pavement. As I'm doing this I'm going through my habits of flashers and mirror checks and lo and behold there is a semi behind me gaining on me. Now I know that he's dealing with the same road conditions that I am, and as I started seeing him fishtail I was hoping that he would at least jackknife, or he was definitely going to kill me. I was doing everything that I could do to keep control of my vehicle and try to move out of his way without going sideways, and he was doing everything he could do to regain control of his truck, when finally there was a patch of pavement enough so that I could move to the side and slow down and watch him slide by me. A little lower he found a patch of pavement and was able to slow down. I crept the rest of the way down that mountain knowing that I had been inches from becoming a statistic.
Driving through nearly 40 Colorado winters have left me with many other stories, but I've written enough.
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