[bkbkr1212]

Note from mod : This thread has been split from HERE


Hi Nirmal/Kishore,
yeah, it was a serious accident. I banged on to a car which had slowed down at a speed breaker.
I saw the car had slowed down.
I have no clue what happened after that. My wife, parents, sister and her kid were all there.
All of them said I didn't slow down.
At the same time I know that I wasn't a break-neck speed. 60,max 80 kmph.
But the sad part is I am still not able to figure out what happened to me at that point of time whether
(1) I accelerated instead of braking?
(2) I got blanked out for a moment.(No I was not under alcohol ;-)) The previous day we all had been to Mysore, slept quite late, was really tired, but not tired enough to doze off.

After giving lots of thoughts, I end up concluding that I got blanked out for a few seconds.
Have any of you friends felt this getting "blanked out" while driving? (What a stupid question to ask?)
Please understand, it's just that I am trying to find out reason.

Now when I drive Zen Estilo, my wife gets so tense, she literally doesn't breathe till we reach destination.
When I was using SX4 also, she used to be tense when I drive (I learned driving only 3 years ago).But at that time, I would (could) shut her up saying "please don't tell me how to drive"
Now,after the accident, I can't do that even :-(

One more query.
Maruti guys said, since airbags have to be replaced, the whole dash will need to be replaced including the instrument controls and other control units
The initial estimate say I will have to shell out anywhere between 90K-1.2 lacs. :-( (Mainly because 50% on airbags, dash etc).
Then bonnet, AC condenser liquid etc etc needs to be replaced.
The estimates runs up to 10 pages.

Service advisor said some work was to be carried out in chassis also. That jitters me a bit.
Could team bhp friends please advise on what all things I should verify when I go for getting my car?
Especially what all should I look in for since there was chassis work done.

Thanks in advance and apologies for such a long post

[kishoryk]

Hi Bkbkr1212,

Apologies for much delayed response.
Hope by now, you and your car are back in good shape!

Sorry to hear what happened to you.. but it's quite possible. I myself have gone into that "blanked-out" stages narrowly missing without even realizing it (like getting off the road on a very long and tiring trips, etc).

And my wife once went through exactly same thing (when she hit a vehicle from behind while slowing down at a speed breaker). Even then she did not know what happened - we guessed probably she pressed on the accelerator instead of break.

So.. don't despair. It's all common. And it's all a learning and next time we will be extra careful. I do believe that Driving is all by experience and not by training/coaching (which probably contributes only to 10% of one's skill).

Now on the repairs part - hope you've got them done with a dealer. Having such repairs done for our Alto at Pratham (ORR near Marathahalli), I trust those guys. Heard also Bimal does a trustworthy job. So if you left your car with one of them, we can feel safe. There is nothing much we can do, I presume, unless we know of a good mechanic around (which I do not, in my case).

Hope, all is well!

Happy and Safe Driving.

Cheers,
KK

[nirmaljusdoit]

Hi Bkbkr1212,

Its natural, ive experienced it too, in mild form both on car & bike. Our minds are constantly processing information, under stress etc & nothing surprising to get overloaded.

Any updates ? I had accident repair done at Pratham Motors & they did a great job. .

Wish your ride a speedy recovery !

[Fordmanchau]

Hi bkbkr,

Sorry to hear about your accident. hope all is now well and your car has been repaired.
As for blanking out, I think it happens, I felt it. I was driving back to hyd yesterday night from Annavaram after a very tiring 2 days. I felt that my eyes were open but my mind was blank. My response time slowed down a lot. Thankfully, I could manage. It was just that I was damn tired and sleep deprived. Took a break and then carried on.
Don't break your head over it. It happens with everyone.

[samish_g]

Hi bkbkr,
Sorry to hear about the incident. Glad to know that you and your family are safe.
Where did you get the estimate from? Is it a MASS?
By the way where did the accident happen? Did the airbags get activated?

Regards

Samish

[sachinj12]

Originally Posted by bkbkr1212

(2) I got blanked out for a moment.(No I was not under alcohol ;-))

This would have happened to everyone at some stage or the other. I too have had my share and one of them has been a close call.

Originally Posted by samish_g

Hi bkbkr,
Did the airbags get activated?

Regards

Samish

The air bags did deploy!!! Read the post :P

[HotChillyPepper]

I feel it is not blanking out, but a state of mind where you could not calculate your car relative velocity with the one at front. Think about this scenario, I am sure many of us would have faced this before:
A car you were following for a while slowing down for a red signal. But while it started slowing down, your mind may be in some other world (may be dreaming about a better ICE setup that guy should have been chosen etc ). But when you realize that you are on a driver seat, your vehicle must have been already stopped just few inches away from the other car.

I feel due to some strange reason this auto pilot feature does not work all the time and hence we kiss the bumper. So whenever I slow down at speed breakers and signals, if I know someone was following me, I will keep a watch on the IRVM. If the other guy not decelerating at enough rate, I will just honk twice. Most of the time I see an immediate response from the other guy.

[prince_pervez]

There are 2 things in such situations:
1) The minds is calculating least damage and complete salvage scenario. e.g the mind thinks it can pull through by steering the car out of collision no matter what amount of pull required.
2) The mind calculates how much damage if I stand on the brakes now.

If no decision is taken the inevitable happens and in layan's term it is called freezing where the decision making ability is zilch.

By the way is your wife also a good driver ? I have seen that if 2 drivers are sitting up front then the one on the passenger seat loses sleep and is judgemental about the driver's capabilities.

Glad to know no one was hurt. Except the car. But then they are built to protect you as well as drive you around. S**t happens man! Relax, you'll pull through.

[sachinj12]

Originally Posted by prince_pervez

I have seen that if 2 drivers are sitting up front then the one on the passenger seat loses sleep and is judgemental about the driver's capabilities.

How very true, whenever I sit in the co-driver seat, I press the floor as if I am braking/accelerating!! It's become a habit, I can't stop that. I do it without my knowledge.

[MX6]

Originally Posted by bkbkr1212

When I was using SX4 also, she used to be tense when I drive (I learned driving only 3 years ago).But at that time, I would (could) shut her up saying "please don't tell me how to drive"
Now,after the accident, I can't do that even :-(

My dad always used to do back seat driving. He doesn't know how to drive at all. I realised that it's all the fears he had about running over someone which never gave him confidence to learn to drive, that is making him comment on my driving.
Till the realisation came, I used to get annoyed with his back seat driving. Now I keep telling my parents, if you are tired, don't worry and go to sleep. It doesn't impact my driving anyway even if I'm the only one awake.
Mostly they doze off.
Guess, instead of shutting your wife up, try listening to her before you get in to the car. Her fears can reveal about your driving style. And don't worry about whether you can shut her now or not. Objective is not to shut people from commenting. Objective is to ensure that you drive safe and the passenger is aware of that fact. So talk to her and identify what makes her comment. Soon you'd find that she's long stopped commenting!
Sorry for this OT. Hope your car is back in action soon!

[bkbkr1212]

First of all thanks a lot for all the replies and advice. I stopped checking that thread after sometime, since no one was responding Hence the delay in replying

Originally Posted by prince_pervez

There are 2 things in such situations:
1) The minds is calculating least damage and complete salvage scenario. e.g the mind thinks it can pull through by steering the car out of collision no matter what amount of pull required.
2) The mind calculates how much damage if I stand on the brakes now.

By the way is your wife also a good driver ? I have seen that if 2 drivers are sitting up front then the one on the passenger seat loses sleep and is judgemental about the driver's capabilities.

No she doesn't drive much. But has very good road sense, very alert and theoretically quite sound.

Atleast now I know that these "blanking out" experiences do happen.
Nirmal, yeah, got my SX4 2 weeks back and I must say Bimal did a fantastic job.

In between another funny thing happened. I was going from ORR towards white field.
Had stopped at the ice cream corner waiting for a truck to clear.
A cycle rickshaw was behind (yes, that was the 1st time I was seeing one in Bangalore)
A nerd was speeding down the flyover, bnaged on to this cycle rickshaw guy and he ht my Zen. Bumper is torn. And the car which hit them sped away without even bothering to look
When I got down I didn't feel bad for my bumper. Two people in the cycle rickshaw had fallen down. Believe me guys, I am not exaggeratting. Both the guys in the rickshaw were hurt and they were sitting on the road crying.They said "saab, peeche se ek gaadi aake toka, hum kya kare?"

Looking at the rickshaw I could figure out they were poor raddiwalas. I wanted to stay for some more time, but my selfish mind (or I was scared to be in another accident spot,albeit minor) worked. I could see people gathering there. I took my car and pushed off. I still feel bad. But if I had stayed back, maybe the whole blame could have come on me saying "I braked suddenly. That's the reason for the accident"

I have started driving SX4. But very less confidence, scared to the core.

The unfortunate part is wife,my parents, sister and her small kid were there in the car.All have seen the accident. Now however good I may drive, this accident is going to be there in our minds for some good amount of time.

As they say life must go on.



Nirmal,
We were discussing about HID lights on another thread. Is it OK if I PM you for some information?

Once again thanks to everyone for the reply.