saw a bad accident today

[paulgolding]

ok, driving tonight about 9 o'clock behind a guy. all of a sudden he stopped. I'd not noticed (as I was keeping my distance) that a car coming the other way had swerved across the road an smashed into the car in front of him. Both cars mashed, the one that swerved (new beetle) lost it's front wheel and most of it's side in the impact !!. . Woman in an astra was so shocked plus had bad neck injuries. Guy in the beetle looked really upset and admitted he had looked down briefly to find a cd.

Got thinking after it happened how you can be driving along minding your own business and be doing nothing wrong and in a split second your life could be in danger. I hope she's ok. obviously not life threatening but she seemed in a lot of pain.

Also thought, if I had left my guitar lesson 5 seconds earlier . . . ?? who knows. Scary huh !!

 

[obi_waynne]

It is indeed a scary thought. Things like this act as a wake up call to us all.

I would however say that the driver being hit is often able to react and save themselves. Obviously it is pretty hard to do and your chances are slim but a lot of people just Freeze or hope that the inevitable collision will not happen to them.

I learned an "escape route" driving methodology. Every few seconds you go through a fantasty scenario along the lines of what if the approaching driver had a heart attack and headed straight for me? Where are the escape routes? In time you develop a subconcious skill so you are mentally prepared when the worst happens. You will automatically look for these swerve zones, know if lanes around you are empty or have a course of action planned out. Even drastic things like spinning your car round so your rear hits the oncoming car will reduce your injury risk.

It highlights the need to stay alert and keep both hands on the wheel AT ALL TIMES doesn't it.

One course of action is to sound your horn. So many drivers omit this and will happily let a car run into them.

Secondly you may have the option of swerving off the road and sharply braking will at least reduce the impact speed.

 

[turbonutter69]

It is indeed a scary thought. Things like this act as a wake up call to us all.

I would however say that the driver being hit is often able to react and save themselves. Obviously it is pretty hard to do and your chances are slim but a lot of people just Freeze or hope that the inevitable collision will not happen to them.

I learned an "escape route" driving methodology. Every few seconds you go through a fantasty scenario along the lines of what if the approaching driver had a heart attack and headed straight for me? Where are the escape routes? In time you develop a subconcious skill so you are mentally prepared when the worst happens. You will automatically look for these swerve zones, know if lanes around you are empty or have a course of action planned out. Even drastic things like spinning your car round so your rear hits the oncoming car will reduce your injury risk.

It highlights the need to stay alert and keep both hands on the wheel AT ALL TIMES doesn't it.

One course of action is to sound your horn. So many drivers omit this and will happily let a car run into them.

Secondly you may have the option of swerving off the road and sharply braking will at least reduce the impact speed.

Waynne I don't understand that? How can spinning the car round reduce injury? If your hit from behind your more likely to incur neck or back injury which can be serious?

 

[obi_waynne]

When a car spins it loses most of its forward momentum letting the other car hit the rear crumple zones. There is generally more space between the rear of the car and driver than the front and the driver and you stand more chance.

Of course every situation is different and every car is different. If a HGV was heading for me I'd try and go backwards into him. At least the seat and headrest protect you a little from the rear.

 

[turbonutter69]

When a car spins it loses most of its forward momentum letting the other car hit the rear crumple zones. There is generally more space between the rear of the car and driver than the front and the driver and you stand more chance.

Of course every situation is different and every car is different. If a HGV was heading for me I'd try and go backwards into him. At least the seat and headrest protect you a little from the rear.

I'm sorry Waynne I don't agree.
For one you'd never have the chance to spin the car round because if you had that much time you'd be able to simply miss a collision. And secondly it doesn't matter what part of the car is hit you can still get serious if not life threatening injuries. A front or rear impact can be serious. Infact in most cases if someone is rear ended then they tend to come off worse than the driver that hit them.

 

[obi_waynne]

Fair enough. I'm certainly not a collision expert. Obviously if there was an escape route you take that but if there isn't your options are cut down. I would tend to agree with your point about not having time to react quickly enough to spin the car round.

I do know though that a full head on crash is better than an offset frontal crash in most cars. (At least on cars made up to 2004, they may have improved things after this with the advent of the NCAP test.)

Read your cars crash test report if this is possible and see where the strengths and weaknesses lie.

 

[turbonutter69]

I'm well and truely safe as my Focus is a EURO NCAP 5. Which if i'm right is the best rating. It also has 6 airbags so all passengers and myself are covered.

 

[MasterAuron]

I learned an "escape route" driving methodology. Every few seconds you go through a fantasty scenario along the lines of what if the approaching driver had a heart attack and headed straight for me? Where are the escape routes? In time you develop a subconcious skill so you are mentally prepared when the worst happens. You will automatically look for these swerve zones, know if lanes around you are empty or have a course of action planned out. Even drastic things like spinning your car round so your rear hits the oncoming car will reduce your injury risk.

That's a really annoying thing to be doing lol. You can't go everywhere in fear of someone crashing into you, if it happens, it happens! If I started to think like that, I'd just crash into a lampost to end the misery. :amuse:

As I travel and work away a lot, I see loads of bad crashes on the motorway but it doesn't phase me one bit. Maybe I'm just weird.