Even for the most daring souls, it takes a lot of guts to drive down the D915 road in Turkey. Named the world's most dangerous road by Warrantywise.co.uk, D915 is infamous for its challenging twists and turns. It is described as a 105-kilometre-long “highway to hell” which stretches between the towns of Of and Bayburt in Eastern Turkey. The road links Turkey's northeast Anatolia province to the Black Sea.
The history of the D915 road can be traced back to the Trebizond Campaign (1916–1918), which resulted in the occupation of the city by Russian forces after a conflict with the Ottoman Empire. It is believed that Russian soldiers constructed the road entirely with hand tools. While certain parts of the road were paved with asphalt at some point, the majority of it is still made of loose gravel.
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The D915 doesn't look all that extreme at first, but as you move forward from either end, the road narrows and steepens, and the tarmac gives way to gravel. It features a total of 38 sharp hairpin turns, including the infamous Derebaşı turns. Over a stretch of 5.1 km, there are 17 of them, ranging in height from 5,617 ft to 6,677 ft above sea level. The road's sharpest sections are so small that when two cars meet from opposite sides, one of them must back up to make way for the other. Additionally, there are no guardrails to prevent cars from tumbling into the abyss below.
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Even with all its perils, D915 is a relatively busy road used by hundreds of locals daily. There are two other alternate roads between Of and Bayburt, but D915 is still the preferred route since it is less of a detour than the other two.
Due to snow blizzards and treacherous weather, parts of the road are blocked throughout the winter. The road may also encounter avalanches, landslides and heavy snowfalls.
