With his track record of visiting edgy destinations, the last place Lives In The Wild star Ben Fogle might have expected to find himself in danger was just outside his own home. However, the 50-year-old, who has previously been filmed everywhere from Chernobyl to the Congo, now says he narrowly avoided being hit by a van.
“I’m a risk taker so I don’t say this lightly – someone is going to get killed in our village,” he darkly warned. Taking to Instagram earlier today to share the news, the daredevil traveller clarified to his 605,000 followers: “I nearly died yesterday. Not on Everest or in some remote jungle. Not in an ocean or a desert, but in a small single track lane outside my home in rural Oxfordshire.”
Ben exclaimed: “Given the things I have done and the risks I have taken, it feels a little ironic that my own near death experience should happen so close to my own home.” He went on to paint a picture of his sleepy and idyllic Oxfordshire village, just outside Henley.”
The location has “no pavements”, meaning that the single track road has to be shared with cyclists, dog walkers, hikers, tractors, cars and delivery drivers to name just a few. However, he added that it is legal to drive at 60mph – the national speed limit – on the same tiny road.
“You can drive at my daughter on her horse or the dogs on their walk at 60mph!!!!” He shuddered: “While my daughter drives her pony along the road because it is the only way to reach the fewer and fewer bridleways, delivery drivers race at the legal 60mph around blind bends to meet home delivery time targets.”
He now fears someone will be killed on the road, after the experience he has just had – and has started a petition to reduce the current speed limit to 20mph – a mere third of what it is now.
Explaining his reasons, he recalled: “A delivery driver driving at the perfectly legal, but obviously dangerous 60mph, careered around one of the many blind bends, threw on its breaks and skidded to a halt just a few feet from me and my dog.
“My life flashed before my eyes. Just as it had done when my boat capsized on the Atlantic Ocean and when my oxygen bottle exploded on Everest, but this was on a dog walk outside my home.”
The frustrated bestselling author and adventurer vented: “I love living here in this rural idyll, but I don’t want to die because our local council doesn’t see fit to implement a 20mph limit for a community that relies on the road as our pavement too.”
He added that both of his children had already suffered “near encounters” with speeding traffic.
He captioned his Instagram post with a response from a rep for Buckinghamshire Council, who said, “Our speed limits are set against Department for Transport guidance and, in this case, the appropriate limit here is considered to be the national speed limit, as it is on many similar rural roads.
“Assessments consider the hierarchy of the road, its character, traffic/pedestrian volumes, vehicle speeds, collision history, and infrastructure in the area to ensure limits are appropriate and legally enforceable.
“As always, we remain responsive to changes in local road and traffic conditions and consider speed limit changes on a case-by-case basis but cannot always agree to every request received.”
A frustrated Ben, who has attached the link for his petition in his Instagram bio, exclaimed: “To [summarise], someone has to have a serious accident (or worse) before they will change the speed limit.
“I’m sure most policies are meant to prevent accidents and deaths BEFORE they happen…”