[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by electric_eel

Correct me if I am wrong but overtaking a stopped school bus is a traffic violation. ...

I don't think so. But you are right in every other respect. A parked vehicle that one cannot see past/through/under is a serious hazard and should be passed slowly and with care. Especially if it is a bus.

Repeating this story, I've told it many times...

When I was fifteen, on my way home from school, I got off the bus and darted around the front. Just as I emerged a car whooshed by. it was close enough to take the coat, that I was carrying in front of me, off my arm. The bus driver gave me a real telling off, and told me to always go around the back, and look carefully before stepping out.

I didn't forget it as a pedestrian or bus passenger; I haven't forgotten it as driver.

[na_agrawal]

Originally Posted by bblost

We exited together. Our cars were parked next to each other.

She had been standing under my outside rear view mirror on the passenger side.

Not to imply anything against you, you did everything right and exactly similar to me. Just putting something below in text for the benefit of others.

I have made a simple habit. After having seen so many videos of children and pets being overrun by the parked cars or them being in their blindspots.
I count the number of children/animals in my visible radius before stepping into the car. After getting into it, while I adjust my AC, android auto, and songs, I count them again in my camera and all mirrors. Even if a single is missing, I DO NOT MOVE! It's a very effective preventive measure which can save his/her/its' life and your life long mental trauma and implications. Quite easy to do if you make it a habit.

Till date, thankfully nothing has gone wrong, and using this method, I have actually saved a kitten once!!

Cheers, Safe driving.
~NA

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by na_agrawal

I have actually saved a kitten once!!

No children in the house but cats, yes. I always check under and around the car. I give a beep on the horn before starting the engine and another before moving. Even if I can see both our cats. There's always a chance of some stranger.

[Turbanator]

Originally Posted by electric_eel

Correct me if I am wrong but overtaking a stopped school bus is a traffic violation.

Originally Posted by navin

Not that I am aware of. That said, most school buses do not have interlocking doors that incapacitate the bus from motion if either of the doors is open or stopping signals such as hazard warning lights and a stop signal arm whenever either door is open.

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

I don't think so. But you are right in every other respect.

I am not aware of Indian laws, but here in Canada and most likely in other countries, you can not cross a School bus when it's stopped. But school buses will always have Red Flashers and Stop signals.
https://www.peelregion.ca/pw/transpo...20school%20bus.

Although you are not required to stop on the other side of a divided road, in some residential localities with low traffic, it's not uncommon for motorists to stop on both sides, as Kids can sometimes run away quickly and cross the road.

I don't think any of the buses have such signs here. This is what I can find about the requirements.

https://ctp.gov.in/RSGuidelines.htm



Regarding what happens to the father, let's have some empathy and stay away from our analysis.

[phi]

Originally Posted by Apex1815

I also have installed a Red Tiger F7N for my Nexon. My Dashcam hangs whenever there is extreme heat (The video display just stucks at a particular image) Eg Car parked in Sunlight during summers in Banglaore where the temperature is closed to 40 degree C.

The system starts working when car cools down (when AC in ON).

Do you also face this kind of issue ?

It seems that the overheat protection on the dashcam is kicking in. I am not sure about Redtiger F7N, but my Viofo A229 Pro has overheat protection, and it turned off by itself once when I had parked the car in the open with sunlight directly hitting the dashcam through the windshield. It was a couple of months ago, and the unit has been working well since. When parked at 40C, the effective temperature on the dashcam's surface can be very high when sunlight falls on it for extended time.

Normally, such a unit would start working again by itself or with a manual restart once it cools.

[rvd8732]

Today, I was riding to office thinking about 2 important projects and yes of course my riding was sedate. While I was nearing to a traffic signal, I saw a guy on bullet trying to squeeze everywhere. When the signal goes green, I am on the extreme left riding straight and I saw this guy still trying to squeeze every where and took a sudden left and hit my bike.

The next thing happens, he is abusing me for weaving around the traffic. I was surprised that he is abusing me for his dangerous riding. If it was a normal day, it would have turned out different but today I was suppose to attend an important meeting so just gave him a thumbs up and left later to see a dent on the silence guard.

Off late, I see a lot of these goon behavior everywhere. It is also evident that these goons are high on green and have no sense of what are they doing.

Traffic cops are no where to be seen now-a-days and this type of behavior is extremely dangerous as it can go to any extent. After this incident, I have decided to use the helmet cam every single day.

[krankstter]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdn9...NpZGVudA%3D%3D

Heard about this early in the morning from my Dad's lecturers' WA group.

Translation: Physics lecturer from Vijayawada driving while wife was in the passenger seat (some say she was asleep in the backseat, not clear as of now but the video says that she was in the co-passenger seat).

I've heard through my Dad's sources that they were in a rush to return back in time for his class that day. Since they were partying late for his wife's birthday, they were probably extremely tired and drowsy.

Vijayawada is known for it's Class 11-12 education factories. Students are under constant pressure while lecturers are under even more pressure, either from themselves (strong sense of wanting to do justice to their students and/or salaries) or from management. I've seen my dad for the past 20+ years giving everything and anything to be there in time and on demand for his students. So I understand how the lecturer could've convinced himself to be driving insanely fast in order to reach there on time. He was on the younger side too which may or may not have added to this rush. I have relatives who claim to have reached Hyderabad from Vijayawada in under 3 hours consistently. If we hear these stories enough, it brainwashes us to make us actually believe that it can be executed safely, thereby pushing us to try it in case our cause is personally justifiable. Most of the times it ends well, doesn't mean it should be attempted regularly. This is definitely not cool (yes, coming from a 25yo) and not safe.

The truck here is literally doing truck things, stopping in the middle of the road. These situations are highly predictable to someone who's been driving in India for a while. The under-run bar, although present, doesn't look like it would stop a bird even, let alone a literal swift. I feel like we should be blaming the truck driver but that doesn't justify the fact that the car was zooming past traffic over speeds of 140 (probably, looks like it). Being tired/drowsy doesn't help.

Unfortunate circumstances.

I've seen a lot people blaming Maruti Suzuki in comments here and on other forums. While I'm in no way condoning the fact that they do indeed make some squishy vehicles, the only way they could've survived this was if they were in a literally tank. The fact that they were in a MS make car has little to no relevance to our situation.

[chaitanyakrish]

Originally Posted by krankstter

Unfortunate circumstances.

I've seen the video and the map location of the crash and found that the truck was parked within the road shoulder.



Whether the truck is allowed to park there is a matter of enforcement issue but the car driver driving on the road shoulder is the main cause of the crash.

I see this bad driving habit very often and is the main reason for underride crashes in India.
As per laws passed in 2010, all trucks must have side and rear underride guards but its enforcement is a failure, just like any other else in our country.

So, car drivers must recognize this risk and avoid driving on the road shoulder.

[Thad E Ginathom]

What a terrifying picture! So sad for the young couple and their families.

We don't know why the truck stopped, but it seems that it was off the main carriageway. Drivers of very large vehicles may comment please, but I'm sure there are times when even getting a broken-down truck to the side of the road is a triumph for the driver. Assuming this truck is broken down, there is not much more he could do.

Condition of truck, under-run bars, battery, lighting, warning lights, etc, is a matter for the truck owner, and they should be made liable. I doubt that it is often possible for the drivers to refuse the duty.

Ramming the truck from behind is a matter for the car driver. I'm sorry to say that, and it sounds callous, but it is true. Especially if the truck was off the carriageway.

[NT_GT]

Originally Posted by SS-Traveller

This Punch driver crashed into a clump of fallen tree branches while busy on his mobile, then reversed out, and continued to the next red light, where he continued to fiddle with his mobile, and nearly rear-ended my stationary car. I don't have a rear dashcam in this car, though.

How dare you cut-off a Punch driver fiddling his mobile?
You are encroaching on his birthrights!

On a serious note, in my list of the scariest actions while driving, fiddling with mobile is just below overtaking on blind curve. The video gives me the chills.

[MyLife_MyCar]

Originally Posted by chaitanyakrish

As per laws passed in 2010, all trucks must have side and rear underride guards but its enforcement is a failure, just like any other else in our country.

We can cry, shout, argue and everything that we want, but it won't make a difference to anyone higher up in the authority!
As I have mentioned in my earlier post, only when a powerful/rich person is involved in accident, the authorities wake up to show that they are doing something about it but miserably fail to enforce anything properly!

By the way, where are we on enforcing the rear seat belts?

Do you know that seat belt rule was first brought up in 2005?

It was in 2005 that wearing seat belts was made mandatory. However, there has been little compliance and lax enforcement since the rule was imposed. In 2012, when popular satirist and actor Jaspal Bhatti lost his life in a car accident, the issue of rear seat belts reared its head.

But it was found that when the authorities had not even been able to enforce the seat belt rule for drivers, how would they do so for the rear seat passengers? So, the debate shifted back to seat belt for drivers.

In 2014, once again a lot of noise was raised for rear seat belts after Union minister Gopinath Munde’s car was hit by another motorist. Following this, the Motor Vehicles Act was overhauled and there were drastic changes made in 2019.

With Mistry’s death, the focus is back on rear seat belts.

India is notorious for road fatalities and many occur for not fastening the seat belts. As per Ministry of Road Transport and Highways report, 15,146 deaths occurred in 2020 due to not wearing seat belts -- 7,810 were drivers and 7,336 passengers.

Even when authorities check vehicles for adherence of rules, they are only bothered if the driver is wearing a seat belt. Rear seat passengers hardly figure on their radar. People also have a wrong notion that if an accident happens, it would impact the front seat occupants more than the rear ones.

Source: Rear seat belt: Why do we give it a miss

[silver-stand]

In my opinion, we have three broader problems:

- Driving culture
- Driving knowledge & patience
- Govt. not doing enough

1. Driving Culture:

In my experience, I have seen people around me talking me down that I'm too fearful when I say some way of driving isn't safe. They indirectly belittle me for driving slower and taking more time.

People take pride in completing a journey much faster than it usually takes. And I have seen in Bla Bla Car app that some people comment badly that a specific driver has a vehicle with 80kph speed lock.

Also, people think when accidents happen it's all chance occurrence and nothing can be done, being oblivious to risk-mitigating-driving techniques like defensive driving and anticipation.

And other drivers on the road won't be patient if you drive safely as per rules. They'll tailgate and honk you to move fast.

All of these cultural elements and others, keep rubbing off on new drivers who just extend this bad culture. But I'm thankful that I have been learning a lot from Team BHP and useful Twitter threads and saving myself from getting dragged into the bad driving culture.

2. Driving knowledge & patience

Once a person is on the road 7-8 hours or more a day, the patience wanes off. The person just would want to finish their journey as soon as they can. It is rare that I come across a driving professional who drives with a decent amount of patience and anticipation.

We once booked an Innova Crysta to travel to Hyderabad on NH-44. The driver got angry with a Wagon-R and what did he do? He overtook the Wagon-R and braked abruptly in front of it to show the hooliganism. I just kept quiet fearing he wouldn't take any of my gyan and may get jerked, becoming even more aggressive on the road.

Also, people don't think getting into clusters isn't safe. They happily get into highway clusters trying to go past it as much as they can. In one such cluster, I was trying to be patient and keeping a safe following distance. I got honked hard by an Etios, who eventually overtook me on the shoulder. Sensing the shoulder isn't even, I braked to let him go and to ensure my own safety.

People in rural areas especially are poorly knowledged about safe bike riding. They only see convenience part of riding a bike and mostly none of safe riding practices.

3. Govt. not doing enough

I have seen for many years discouraging Tobacco and Alcohol consumption in theaters and TV. Why I'm not seeing the same amount of efforts being put into educating the masses about safe driving and road safety?

Often highways don't have enough sign boards. In NH-44, from Hyderabad to Kurnool, I rarely see speed-limit signs. No speed-breaker signs before many speed-breakers in most of the roads. And rumble strips with uneven heights. Not enough U-turns causing local traffic to drive on the wrong side. And the list goes on.

We have someone at the helm boasting about how travel times are being reduced with road development projects. I hope to see the leadership pridefully boasting how they have made Indian roads safer for all with robust initiatives.

[RMN]

Originally Posted by vinay.sathyan

This sentence just seems wrong, it sounds like the person knowingly and willfully drove the car over.
No person/father can do such a thing knowingly and I think he would never recover for the rest of his life knowing he was the cause of his kid's death.

Agreed! Clearly, it was an honest mistake of the father's part. If he was under the impression that the kid was in the housing premises or with the family, he would have just thought that he ran over a rock or something - which is aplenty on our roads.

[Sensible_Speed]

Originally Posted by anjan_c2007

Bengaluru:- Father accidently reverses car killing his one and a half year old toddler!

They family was back after attending a relative's marriage ceremony. It happened at HSR Layout, Bengaluru at 11.30 pm. They had unloaded the luggage from the car. The father was at the wheel while the toddler was near the car. The father drove the car unaware of her presence crushing her. Locals rushed the toddler to a hospital where she breathed her last. The father was arrested and released on bail by the police.

It was most criminal and unpardonable on the part of the father to drive his car ( looks like a Creta) fatally crushing the little girl child (seen in photo below), aged one and a half year.

Attachment 2597975

News 18 photo

The news:-
https://www.news18.com/amp/india/tod...ource=inshorts


Times of India newslink( above quoted news)

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/.../109513172.cms

This highlights yet another flaw of SUVs. The high riding position means you miss pretty much everything below the window line. Imagine the pain this must have caused the father. Extremely saddening.

[svsantosh]

Originally Posted by ashbhat2

Not quite sure how the first swerve happened,

Most likely the rear left tyre had a blow out, tube tyre, instant flat, and then the sequence started.

The Tata Ace did not have a chance.