Slippery streets bring Regina man Tik Tok fame

Regina drivers slip and slide in TikTok video WATCH: One young filmmaker caught multiple cars hitting a curb one morning in Regina. Stefanie Davis explains.

REGINA — A Regina man posted a video montage of drivers losing control of their vehicles during Tuesday’s snowfall and in less than 24 hours, it has received millions of views on Tik Tok.

Kellen Hodgins sat at the intersection of Parliament Avenue and Massey Road on Tuesday morning around 10 a.m. He spent about 30 minutes taking videos of people losing control on the icy roads and swerving into a curb. In one instance, a vehicle jumps the curb and ends up on a sidewalk.

He posted the video on Tik Tok in the evening, and overnight it received more than 7.8 million views and 1.4 million likes. He also gained almost 30,000 followers.

“I wasn’t really expecting that, or wasn’t really what I was wanting,” he said. “It just kept getting promoted, and I was just shocked.”

Hodgins said he decided to take some video of the area because he knew, from personal experience, it’s a bad spot in the winter.

“Last year, about this time of the year, we had the same conditions of freezing rain and snow covering a layer on top of it,” Hodgins said. “My car did the same thing those cars in the video did - slid into the curb going about five km/h and I snapped the right front tire off of my car.”

He said his intention was not to encourage “bullying” to the drivers who are shown in the video, but instead to remind people to slow down on icy roads and get their winter tires on.

WINTER TIRE SURGE

Following the first snowfall, tire shops in Regina have been busy.

At Quality Tire Service, the phones have been ringing off the hooks as people rush to get their winter tires on.

“It’s been pretty crazy,” Garth Cronk from Quality Tire Service said. “It’s that time of the year. ”Since the snowfall hit it’s really backed up, it’s typical once people start sliding around.”

Cronk said Saskatchewan typically has the fewest motorists each year who switch over to winter tires, but that trend is changing.

“We’re starting to get more people putting winter tires on,” he said. “The thing to remember is that with winter tires, you can stop a lot faster than anyone else.”

Cronk said the best options for motorists is to drop their vehicles off in the morning for their tire change and pick them up in the evening.

“It’s a safety issue and you want to make sure it’s done right,” he said.

He said winter tires should be installed once temperatures dip below seven degrees.

In its list of safe driving tips during the winter, SGI says drivers should give themselves more time to get to their destination, travel at an acceptable speed, stay alert when approaching intersections, avoid cruise control and stay at least a three second distance behind other cars.