[ghodlur]

Unbelievable. A record 100+ vehicles were involved in a major highway pile up in Texas, USA. 2 people were found dead and more than 100 people injured in the high speed accident on the intestate highway in Texas. The major reason was the fog inspite of which the vehicles were at speeds above 70mph on a thanksgiving holiday. The officials say the accident was of catastrophic proportions with 18 wheeler tractor trailers above cars, cars on top of cars.

More details in the links below.
http://www.dnaindia.com/world/report...ighway_1768381

http://thetrendingreport.com/over-10...ghway-pile-up/

http://www.krtv.com/news/at-least-2-...ghway-pile-up/

[carzone]

Ouch! A bigger Ouch!
100+ vehicles!
Even we have fog here in India, but I thank the roads that don't let us do such speeds here!

This shows even the safety measures like foglamps, rear foglamps cannot help much if you don't drive according to the road conditions.

may the deceased RIP.

EDIT: The pic shows the severity of the incident.





pics from Ghodlur's links.

[paras211]

guess the fools on the expressway driving with the hazard lights on aren't that foolish.
It helps in visibility. But the truly wise thing to do is to pull over with the hazard lights on until you can see where your going.

[hillram]

I just read about this.What a tragedy for thanksgiving holiday,given the fact most of them must have been heading for a festive time.RIP for those departed souls.

[Koenigsegg220]

Woah !
That is one major pile up, which looks like a scrapyard. The comment below describes the thickness of the fog

"Jefferson County Sheriff's Office Deputy Rod Carroll told The Associated Press the fog was so thick that deputies didn't immediately realize they were dealing with multiple accidents."

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/na...exas2dead.html

[Omtoatom]

Thanks Ghodlur and this is very unfortunate. I've driven on several occasions through the Jefferson County on the I-10 where this has happened. Got some friends in Beaumont, the town mentioned in the news report, which also happens to the seat of the county. Will check on their safety.

In Texas, motorists have a tendency to go over the 70 mph freeway speed limit - sometimes even over by a good 15-20 mph. In a dense fog type of situation which btw is quite rare in Texas, that is fraught with risk. Also it doesn't help that highway troopers in Texas are known to be a tad lenient with speeding tickets as opposed to their counterparts in states like Florida, Virginia, Maryland, Ohio etc. which have a history of enforcing speeding fines. In TX, the long standing joke is that the speed limit is more like a recommendation - much like in India.

Most motorists today also have cop radars installed in their cars - just in case they were to encounter a 'by-the-book' state/highway trooper. As it is, it is impossible to man or 'speed trap' all sections on the highway considering the sheer physical area of the USA. So there's quite a lot of "speeding in pockets" that happens on the interstates and freeways. Thanksgiving is generally associated with heavy traffic movement owing to the long holiday. That doesn't aid matters either.

[ghodlur]

Germany is not far behind as far as pileup of cars is concerned, this time on the Autobahn A45 motorway. A 100+ cars were involved in the pileup due to the adverse snow being the culprit. Details below.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...m_hp_ref=world

http://www.thelocal.de/society/20130312-48479.html

Belgium has witnessed never heard before kind of massive taffic jam running up to 994 miles or 1600kms due to the recent snow hitting the European region.

[shipnil]

Originally Posted by ghodlur

Belgium has witnessed never heard before kind of massive taffic jam running up to 994 miles or 1600kms due to the recent snow hitting the European region.

The piece on Belgium looks wrong. It is very small country, roughly the size of 3 / 4 districts of Maharashtra. So 1600 Km is not possible.

[ghodlur]

Originally Posted by shipnil

The piece on Belgium looks wrong. It is very small country, roughly the size of 3 / 4 districts of Maharashtra. So 1600 Km is not possible.

More links to substantiate the traffic jam news. Belgium is known to have traffic jams running upto 250kms, so this must be mother of all jams atleast known to Europe.
http://www.vosizneias.com/126016/201...cks-out-trains.

I assume Belgium may have a couple of Thane district equivalents.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by shipnil

The piece on Belgium looks wrong. It is very small country, roughly the size of 3 / 4 districts of Maharashtra. So 1600 Km is not possible.

Not true about this not being possible.

Being Dutch and having lived very close to Belgium this is entirely possible. It's a small country but heavilly populated with a very good infrastructure, highways, freeways and lot of provincial roads and or secondary roads.

This link is all in Dutch or rather Flamish as it's aa Belgium news site, its actually from last month, so looks like they've shattered their "old record" again this month. :

http://www.knack.be/nieuws/belgie/no...0039008335.htm

It mentions 1258 km on the main roads, but on the total Belgium roads more than 4000 kilometers was measured.

These measurements come from the TomTom GPS Traffic service. Which is pretty accurate. I know because some of my staff were involved in its developments.


Here are some links on the 1600 km: http://www.hln.be/hln/nl/3804/Belgie...-1600-km.dhtml
Jeroen

[moralfibre]

Seems like long pileups are becoming common place. It happened in Texas, it happened on the famous Autobahn and it now happened on Interstate 77 in south Virginia near the Virginia - North Carolina border:

News article.

May the soul of the deceased rest in peace.

[ghodlur]

A 100 car pile up was reported in South Korea near the Incheon international airport. Fog & Icy road conditions are said to be the main cause of this pileup. Sadly two lives were lost in this incident with 65 people injured.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...d-42-hurt.html

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-31403615

[braindead]

Originally Posted by paras211

guess the fools on the expressway driving with the hazard lights on aren't that foolish.
It helps in visibility. But the truly wise thing to do is to pull over with the hazard lights on until you can see where your going.

I have to disagree with you on that statement. Sacrificing indicators is never a good idea, especially when you are fast and reactions need to be quick and decisive. If the fellow ahead of me indicates left while braking hard, I may consider evading to the right.
Then there is always the issue of having to change lanes without indicating.

I am of the opinion that even if hazard warning lights are visible from far away, in rain at night, they are very disorienting and distracting.

[drmohitg]

I have a simple question. Everytime we talk about traffic in India, we also draw parallels from our counterparts in western countries and how people follow rules there and general driving common sense and etiquette. Then how do they end up with such huge pile ups time and again. If the visibility is near Zero then why do they continue to drive at such high speeds? Even we in India start crawling when visibility drops down specially in northern states. An accident in that case will result in a nudge or a broken bumper at the maximum but not such horrific accidents.

[braindead]

In my observation, the proportion of idiots in a given population is pretty much constant throughout the world.

That said, on a wide, straight, and monitored road like the Pune Mumbai Expressway, I have observed that even if the traffic slows down for bad weather, its nowhere near slow enough to get away with a small scratch or bump in case of a crash.

I guess the thought process that we use for driving on roads like the expressway is very different than for a B road (most of India).
On the expressways, our driving is predominantly guided by lane markings and relative speeds to each other. In case of emergency, we take too late to realize how fast we are and our breaking distance. On the other hand, driving in towns or small roads, we probably use the same part of the brain as we use for walking. That's why we don't keep crashing into each other even when the traffic is apparently chaotic.