Happened to me a bunch of times yesterday, I did what xviper said. Let off the gas. I was going about 50 when it happened, if you are in a straight line the water will slow you down enough to regain traction.

The most annoying thing about it for me was holding up traffic, I am usually speeding away from the peeps behind me

 

I usually just let go of the steering wheel, slam on the gas, and close my eyes.

No really, I always let off of the gas. After reading xvipers post I had to make sure if I was in an S2ki forum or a airplane pilot's forum. I don't think that my mind would operate fast enough to do all of those things.

He kind of reminded me of the movie "Airplane" when they were trying to land and they were screaming all of those instructions to the guy flying the plane.

ease on the accelerator
Keep your nose up
your leaning to the right
straignhen her up
check the air pressure
you're coming in too fast got damn it!

 

Forget the rest. If you had enough momentum to do 4 360's you were driving too fast for the conditions.

Think about it. The difference between you getting out unharmed and you being a quadraplegic responsible for the death of 8 people is simply a roll of the dice.

Do everyone a favour and pull your head in.

 

I'll add my 2 cents worth. Now is it hydroplane or aquaplane? I guess it's both just depends whether you are from the US, Canada or Europe. To prevent or recover from loss of traction whether it is on water, ice whatever? The first thing you should be doing is looking far enough down the road,(a clear path), to visually locate a stationary object. NOT something that you want to hit of course! This is called "high aim". To always look far enough ahead to find an escape route out of trouble. When your car begins to lose traction with the road surface your immediate reaction should be to bring both your feet away from the pedals towards the seat. DO NOT TOUCH THE BRAKE OR GAS. With your eyes looking far down the road you should be able to concentrate on a clear path to safety. Fast reaction time is the key because if the rear of the car begins to fishtail your hands better be moving quickly on the steering wheel to counter the spin that you will eventually always recover from if you are quick enough. The distant object that you had made eye contact with, when fishtailing, will actually appear to be moving on the horizon. When it stops moving it is time to counter steer in the other direction. Again reaction time is crucial. You may have to counter steer back and forth 2-3 times depending on the speed at which the spin began. You can control a spin from high speeds if you have excellent reflexes and are able to safely practice. I would recommend a skid control school to everyone. It's controlled fun behind the wheel of someone elses car.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Drunken_Monk
Is there any way to recover once your car has lost its traction when say going down the freeway?

 

Well actually it is pretty easy to regain control on hydroplannig. Belive it or not if you are not doing like 90 on heavy rain, your car will gain traction much faster than you expected. The only trick is to be ready. As soon as you get the traction you need to be carefull to not lose it again because, in most of the accidents people gain traction and they dont even know they have it, so they go on hitting the brakes or gas or somethin and lose it again. On a regular accident from the moment that the car loses traction to the moment that the car stops, the car gains traciton at least 3-4 times where if you react quick and right you can save yourself. That is the thing that they teach on those driving courses. Of course if you are driving 80 mph and you slam the brakes and keepem there until you stop, you are not gonna gain any kind of traction this only goes for you letting the gas and brakes off after the car loses traction.
The problem that I get is at night time while you are doing 65 on the freeway you dont see a puddle of water and your right tire hits it, ofcourse it pulls your car about half a lane to the right on a lucky day. I hate when that happens, very dangerous too.

 

Foot off throttle, prepare to countersteer, but do not overcompensate, which could put you into a fishtailing mess. Also, we were taught in driving school (Bondurant) to always keep your eyes in the direction you want to end up in, even if you are sideways - your mind will sort of automatically (Zen-like) encourage your hands to do the right things. Like a Jedi.

 

I'm not sure I agree w/ everyones advice to back out of the trottle. Any sudden decel (and backing out of the trottle can cause this depending on gear) can move far too much weight forward and make the loose rear-end even worse.

Do nothing, do not slow down or speed up (On the track we call it neutral throttle) no sudden movements w/ the steering unless you're counteracting sliding. Continue to travel straight and smoot till your out of the puddle and have traction again. Then slow the down. You're going too fast for the conditions.