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Sadly a man died in this collision, 10 people hurt,all because the lgv driver wasnt paying attention.
and the media report courtesy of the chester chronicle.
Jeez...i can't even begin to imagine what it must have been like for the people in those cars 🙁
He must have been asleep - barely seemed to notice he was ploughing through stationary traffic.
Very lenient sentence for killing someone.
Sun was in his eyes, I think that's a valid excuse.
ack!
anyone else brace themselves as you could see from the sound data something was going to happen
Tragic for all involved.
Absolutely brutal. 🙁
Looks like at least the rearmost driver saw it coming because he got his wheels turned to the left before the impact. An action that may have saved lives.
the justice system is never going to eradicate this events. Fortunately human ingenuity will increasingly do so. Already you can buy cars with anti collision controls. It might take decades, but eventually I expect all HGVs will be obliged to have the same, if not all new vehicles. Even now they are not prohibitively complex or expensive. Soon they will be as common as reversing sensors and air bags.
Already you can buy cars with anti collision controls
True that, got one of these systems on my Golf. It's very clever, but false positives make you jump, mind you 😯
Wouldn't be without it though.
What does it actually do v8ninety? Is it an auto-brake type thing?
Abimissmal driving, and worse sentencing. 2.5 years for that.
Sorry, can't comment any more for fear of switching on caps lock...
It's clever cruise control. Keeps you a set distance away from the car in front or auto queues below 20mph. Soon we won't even need to get in the car to get there...
@GrahamS, its radar controlled...
Plus it is always passively on (unless you manually turn it off) watchcing traffic ahead. If it detects a rapidly closing distance that there have been no driver inputs to avoid it will flash a big red warning on the dash, beep really loud, and even hit the brakes really hard. Quite often, but not always all three. I think that it escalates quickly, so to speak. The fun (and how I'm familiar with this!) comes for example when you are aproaching a roundabout with stationary traffic in lane 2 that curves to the left, but the right lane is clear. You proceed at a sensible speed because you can see its clear, but the car 'panics' because it can see stationary traffic straight ahead. Also occasionally an issue in those situations when someone is turning off the road ahead of you, and you can see from their trajectory that they will be long gone before you get there so you don't need to slow down. That can 'scare' the car (and the driver!) too. Mostly it's very clever and unobtrusive....clever cruise control. Keeps you a set distance away from the car in front
Interesting, sounds quite cool v8ninety, thanks.
My parents were involved in a similar incident about 40 years ago (before I was born). Came over the slight crest of a motorway, traffic was stationary and because of the angle of the road and the low sun you simply couldn't see it.
My Dad steered onto the hard shoulder, it was the only option open to him, he was too close to brake.
Then a coach came over the crest in the middle lane and ploughed straight into the line of cars. 🙁 The wreckage missed them by a few metres.
If I'm at the back of a queue of traffic like that I keep the brake lights on and give myself loads of space in front to accelerate into if something is coming up a bit fast behind.
not overly keen on watching the video, but I'll remember this, cheers.
If I'm at the back of a queue of traffic like that I keep the brake lights on and give myself loads of space in front to accelerate into if something is coming up a bit fast behind.
The auto braking things are impressive, but my worry about them is that they let you drop your concentration levels. In some ways aren't you starting to take the responsibility off the driver? When will somebody get away with an incident like this by, somehow, claiming the brakes didnt come on when they expected them too?
I'm in two minds about them. A great aid and enhancement to vehicle safety systems, but a step toward lazy driving.
??
It did look like the guy at the back tried to move away. I always leave room in front of me in queues to make such a manoeuvre .
I hear you, [i]but[/i] Mr Average McDriver's concentration levels are way down there already. And even excellent drivers have lapses,they are human after all. If they are going to lapse anywhere it's going to be on the sensory depravation machine that is a dull motorway at circa 70mph (and 99% of the time they'll get away with it, which will alter their risk perception etc etc). I was suspicious of the device (it came specced, didn't choose it), but I'd reccomend it to anyone now.The auto braking things are impressive, but my worry about them is that they let you drop your concentration levels.
[i]If I'm at the back of a queue of traffic like that I keep the brake lights on and give myself loads of space in front to accelerate into if something is coming up a bit fast behind.[/i]
I was taught that, along with an extra tactic of controlling the traffic behind by slowing down early, this allows cars to catch up and join a mini queue of your own making at say 30mph, before you close up on the stationary queue and come to a halt. The instructor was an ex traffic cop. Works really well and I used it all the time now rather than just watching the traffic approaching and trying to work out if they are slowing down enough.
The other life saving bit of info...turning right across the centre of the road? Keep the wheels pointing straight ahead and only turn them when you start moving to enter the side road. Leaving the wheels turned across the oncoming traffic turns a simple rear end shunt into a shunt followed by a high speed side impact.
I'm getting increasingly p£&&@d at hgvs and this morning on the m3 a coach tailgating really really close. So close you can't even see their badge on the grille. This morning I was so f£&@ed off that I put my phone out the window and took a pic of the national express coach 5 ft from my bumper. When I turned off he gave me a load of aggressive hand gestures and kept pointing to his dash cam. Bring it on I say, the dash cam ought to keep these idiots from tailgating, how do they get away with it with 50 people on board. Could be anyone's kids on there...