Check and Check Again

I have just reached the first anniversary of my caravan experience. Last week I had an accident where my caravan became unhitched whilst travelling at 45 mph on the A38. Fortunately no one was hurt other than my damaged pride.

The reason was because I hitched the caravan whilst it faced a downhill slope. I lined up to the ball and lowered it down looked for the button to lift, put the lever on and then tested the connection by lowering the jockey wheel. The caravan and car both lifted simultaneously, so I assumed the connection was sound. I then drove for twenty miles through narrow lanes, where I had to reverse twice, due to oncoming lorries with no problems.

Then whilst on an uphill part of the major road the parting occured.

My mistake was not to realise the caravan had pushed the back of the car down significantly because of the slope. So when the car lifted it was only reverting back using it's springs and not being lifted by the caravan.

So I implore you to check and check again as this could easily have caused a major accident.