[Ramp]

Originally Posted by RIC.BURNS

Glad that you and the passengers are safe. Was it a head-on? Did the airbags deploy?

No it was not head on. When i was taking U turn, this Tata Ace came on wrong direction diagonally to my car and hit the left head light which then he took off the entire front portion before he stopped.
No Airbags deployed as the crash was mainly on front bumper / grill / other electricals and on bonnet.

[Fauji]

Originally Posted by suhaas307

^^

Four acquaintances lost their lives in the wee hours of Tuesday morning, while another guy is battling for life in the ICU. .

I was shocked to read the news in the morning. I too had seen this tastefully done car in Indiranagar. May the souls of deceased rest in peace and the injured recover fast.

The road till Kolar now is fantastic and one can really zip. That must be the reason for this accident. However, the traffic beyond Mulbagal when it becomes two lane is pretty bad at night. After reading the incident, i had two questions.

a) Parking of trucks without hazard lights is a common feature on our highways. How do we help prevent this?

b) Many of us driving on the highway have noticed trucks driven without any rear lights or even a reflector. One comes to see them only when you are closer. How can this be prevented?

Is training truck drivers in safe driving the answer?

[rohanjf]

Originally Posted by Fauji

....
a) Parking of trucks without hazard lights is a common feature on our highways. How do we help prevent this?

b) Many of us driving on the highway have noticed trucks driven without any rear lights or even a reflector. One comes to see them only when you are closer. How can this be prevented?

Is training truck drivers in safe driving the answer?

I guess, not going beyond 80 kmph at nights is the easiest (but not the best) way we can save ourselves.

I feel most of the highway truckers are pretty safe drivers. It is the lack of maintenance of the truck that causes this kind of accidents. What can a trained truck driver do, if the truck's owner refuses to spend money in fixing all the lights, low-slung bumpers and other safety devices?

In any accident, the driver gets blamed and gets fined/jailed. With his limited income, can he actually maintain the truck? The law does not seem to hold the truck's owner responsible when the driver has valid licence.

[Vik0728]

Originally Posted by rohanjf

I feel most of the highway truckers are pretty safe drivers. It is the lack of maintenance of the truck that causes this kind of accidents. What can a trained truck driver do, if the truck's owner refuses to spend money in fixing all the lights, low-slung bumpers and other safety devices?

In any accident, the driver gets blamed and gets fined/jailed. With his limited income, can he actually maintain the truck? The law does not seem to hold the truck's owner responsible when the driver has valid licence.

+1 to that rohanjf. Couldn't agree more with you bro.

I think the RTO squad should seize these trucks which don't have the basic safety features like working tail lights or hazard lights. They should impose heavy fines on the Truck Owners as well ensure that these issues are addressed by them before releasing the Trucks.
In india, the "Word of Mouth" can easily match the Population explosion and once few Truck owners are held, pretty much every truck owner will fix their Trucks.

OT - One thing which I believe any responsible driver should adopt is planning a Night drive. I strongly believe that if one decides to have a long night drive, he/she should ensure they have enough rest prior the journey so that if not anything, they remain alert/active during the drive. If this has not been done, they should simply choose the better option....Avoid the Night Drive!!

[goandude]

Originally Posted by Klub Class

Mistake 2 : On approaching the curve and realizing that you're way too fast, you braked hard

In this scenario braking hard will transfer the weight from back to front of the car, resulting in the loss of traction of rear wheels and an over-steer making you car spin, literally. Ideally, you should be accelerating so as to make the rear wheels not loose grip.

Just my two cents.

But sometimes a situation like this can crop up suddenly especially if you dont know the road too well. A good example of this is the Nippani ghat, going north, where suddenly a fabulous straight road curves sharply. The best thing to do is nothing. As any acceleration / breaking would reduce the available grip on the wheels, resulting in a skid. Please see this article on available grip Grip | Accelerating, Braking & Cornering

[sgmitr13]

I normally find the trucks parked on the road shoulder, although they are not supposed to on a highway, but given the education levels of our truck drivers we can't expect more. But, I find our own well educated folks overtaking on the road shoulders. You can notice many such on Coimbatore - Palakad L&T bypass road and end up crashing on to a stationary vehicle.

Imagine we ourselves pull over to a road shoulder to take an emergency phone call, are we safe from such left overtaking (albeit road shoulder) drivers?

A safe speed in the US is 65 mph, that translates to 110 kmph, how many of our own speed at the excess of 120 kmph with the new zippy cars like Swift and VW cars.

Complaints and actions on erring truck drivers alone wont help much brother.
We as responsible son, husband, father, employer need to introspect and enlighten our dear ones.

Originally Posted by akshay380

Yeah I have seen this car on OMR before and just to recollect, I had even given a written complain to KR Puram traffic inspector to forward the same to NHAI guys to act against these wrongly parked vehicles. That was after three people were killed near my house in a similar accident. RIP.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by Fauji

a) Parking of trucks without hazard lights is a common feature on our highways. How do we help prevent this?

... ... ...

Is training truck drivers in safe driving the answer?

No. Training car drivers in safe driving is the answer. It is not safe to drive fast when you cannot fully see over the range of your stopping distance

Of course, the driver of a disable vehicle should make sure some signale or warning is there. However: Driver hits object. Knee-jerk reaction: blame object. Wrong!

Originally Posted by suhaas307

They were driving to/from Hoskote and crashed into an 18-wheeler that was parked on the left side of the road,while attempting to overtake a vehicle from the left-side.

Suggested sample thought process: The vehicle ahead is moving in, or has just entered the middle or right lane: it may be overtaking a slow or stationary vehicle.

Trying to think like that, all the time, is what driving is about. Accidents, often, need not have happened. We might have thought about something, but didn't.

Many of the events in this thread are sad. When they concern members, their friends or family, they are so much more sad. Sympathy and condolences.

[speedsatya]

Training is needed for sure .

But more importantly ,the law has to be stricter ! Right now ,we have the same fine no matter what speeds we do . 90 kph or 190 kph or 290 kph .It is 300 INR ! Why the heck would anyone bother ? Everyone knows that they can pay lesser fines without receipts and get away .

Drunk driving . How many drunk drivers actually go to prison ? And ,how many are actually scared of the cops ?

In Japan ,the owner of a vehicle has to pay a big fine if the vehicle breaks down on the road . Even in the Middle East ,traffic police are strict .And offenders are punished severely .

Here ,no one bothers about overloaded vehicles ,no one is worried about poorly maintained vehicles .

If we had a law which ensured that vehicles without tail lights would be impounded , this 18 wheeler owner would have surely ensured everything was in place .

If only we had a law ,where speeding drivers are punished real bad , these youngsters might have been more careful or atleast their parents would have been more cautious .


But then,no one reacts here unless it is their own family members who are involved in an incident .

Everyday on the toll road to electronic city in Bangalore,I see so many cars with tbhp or govt of india stickers drive like mad .But all of them shamelessly slow down ,when they approach the only place where the speed guns are seen once in a while ,and when you notice that the cops arent there ,almost everyone floors the A pedal. Such is the sorry state in our country .

Following traffic rules here only means the probability of being involved in an accident or a road rage incident is very very high .

[hemanth.anand]

Any one who was stuck in Yesterday's Traffic pile up on the BETL would know how bad it was...and for o reason whatsoever.
When We were just waiting in between this jam and hoping that the traffic would clear, I saw a small accident.

Just beside our company cab, There was one more car with sufficient gap between the two vehicles and also sufficient gap between the other car and the safety wall.
One activa with a 25-30 year old guy driving it with an old lady aged around 55-60 riding pillion came between the two vehicles.

Then suddenly without any indication or withou looking at anything, he turned left in front of the other car towards the wall so that he can drive along the wall.
In a fraction of a second, he was hit by another pulsar and the old lady fell down with the vehicle. Below graphic may explain it better.



After this, the most amusing thing was, the activa driver didn't even look at the lady but straight away removed his half-helmet and dashed towards the pulsar guy to start a quarrel.
That lady got up soon and came and tried to pull him away, but he wanted to quarrel at any cost.
Then two wheelers around him then scolded him and told him to come back since it was his mistake and not the pulsar's

This should also qualify for the bad driver's thread

[amitwlele]

Originally Posted by hemanth.anand

After this, the most amusing thing was, the activa driver didn't even look at the lady but straight away removed his half-helmet and dashed towards the pulsar guy to start a quarrel.

Isn't that mostly the case in such scenarios. The person who is in the wrong makes the first move and the loudest noise.

The general mentality is that since they know that they are in the wrong they start shouting and creating a scene thinking that such behaviour would result in keeping the other person in check. Rarely do we see other motorists supporting or taking sides as everybody is busy in moving along and not wasting time.

[BheemBoy]

Saw this in today's Deccan first page: BMW Crash

English ePaper: Deccan Chronicle (DC) AP's best online Newspaper

Two of his friends escaped with minor injuries but the birthday boy was not lucky. RIP

[Patriot_Vishwas]

Saw this horrific accident site today @ noon near the Yellamma Dasappa Institute of Technology.
The viewers() told me that this Maruti Omni hit a Hyundai Santro!
The Driver's compartment was not easily recognizable due to the hit.
You can see the Ambulance in the background(Picture:1).
Picture 2 shows the compartment and Pic 3:Shows the car again.
Hope the driver recovers ASAP.

[ankan.m.blr]

This is a very bad crash, going by the state of the omni. Did you manage to see the santro ? Hope occupants of both the cars were not hurt seriously.

OT: The omni has a crahs guard.Is it correct to assume the impact inside the omni cabin is less due to the crash guard?

[suhaas307]

Originally Posted by suhaas307

^^

Four acquaintances lost their lives in the wee hours of Tuesday morning...

...Kiran Machado is a friend's bother - they could not identify his body. God Speed dear friend. God Speed.

So the report in TOI was wrong. But I was wrong too.

Apparently, while they were driving (at considerable speed) a car from the opposite lane swerved right into their path. And to avoid this guy, the driver of the Civic swerved left and went straight into an unlit 18-wheeler parked by the side of the road.

Still not sure if it's completely true. But this is what I was told by reliable sources.

It's a sad thing anyway. The driver shouldn't have been tempted to go fast on the new stretch.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Apparently, while they were driving (at considerable speed) a car from the opposite lane swerved right into their path. And to avoid this guy, the driver of the Civic swerved left and went straight into an unlit 18-wheeler parked by the side of the road.

That makes me wrong too, but we could only go on the information available at the time.