Angry car owner brake checks a loaded truck: A passenger's POV

For no fault of the truck driver, an ego-hurt driver put us all in harm's way. I was too scared to even ask him why he did that.

BHPian ashkamath recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

I checked the entire Team-BHP threads and couldn't find anything on the menace of Brake Checking and the harm it could do to motorists. Hence this post.

Brake checking is when a driver intentionally and suddenly applies their brakes without a reason, often to scare or cause the following vehicle (vehicle behind) to collide with them. It is considered reckless driving and is illegal in many countries including the USA & Europe.

A couple of years ago, I was on a trip from Goa to Himachal Pradesh (Jalori Pass) & back for an Auto group meeting with 3 other persons. I hadn't met the other 3 persons who were also members of the group ( but from different states/cities) and we connected only through our group WhatsApp and agreed to form a team for the 10-12 days road trip. So, I was meeting all of them for the first time.

The car, a Skoda Rapid was owned and driven by an Army Major who also happened to be a super speciality doctor. While we 3 passengers were totally chilled out, the owner/driver, Major Saheb was a bit edgy throughout the trip. He would honk incessantly without any reason, make some dangerous overtakes, and drive at some insane speed at times. He would also get irritated at the slightest delay at the tolls or if any vehicle in front didn't give way. That got on our nerves too, however, we were hesitant to advise him as he was the owner of the car we were the passengers and we all were strangers to each other.

While driving in Punjab, there was this fully laden truck in front of us trudging very slowly, the road was narrow and Major Saheb honked incessantly and also hurled some curses at the driver for not giving way. After say 45 seconds or a minute or so, he managed to overtake the heavy truck drove directly in front of it and braked abruptly. I could hear the truck suddenly groaning heavily as it too braked. Then Major Saheb who kept an eye on the rearview mirror, pressed the gas, went about 20 feet and braked abruptly again. The truck behind was so close that I thought he would rear-end us. The truck braked again and I could see the whole truck shake violently due to the heavy load and I was genuinely scared. While keeping an eye on the RVM, Major hurled some expletives at the truck (B******, I will teach him a lesson.. Blah blah)and repeated the abrupt braking a couple of more times and then we sped off. I was really shaken by that incident. Here we have an army officer and a medical doctor who is putting himself and his co-passengers and the truck driver in harm's way for no fault of the truck driver.

I knew that the truck driver was minding his own business and the truck was groaning under the load as it trudged on the road slowly while our Skoda Rapid was just zipping past other vehicles on the road. And for no fault of the truck driver, an ego-hurt driver put us all in harm's way. I was too scared to even ask him why he did that.

Brake checking is illegal in most North American jurisdictions and can result in serious penalties, including: Fines, License suspension, Jail time, and Civil liability for damages and injuries. However in India, it's quite lenient and for an offence of Abrupt Braking without sufficient reason, under section 177 of MVA, the fine is Rs. 100 for the first offence and Rs. 300 for subsequent offence.

Now, with ADAS in many cars, this poses another issue, there are incidences when say a car A with ADAS decides to apply brake because say a car B in the other lane came too close and then car C behind rear ends the car A. This falls in the grey area of brake checking. Again the counterargument is that car C shouldn't be tailgating car A so closely and tailgating is also generally considered illegal in many states in the USA.

So guys, have you ever faced road rage when a car brake-checked in front of you or did you ever lose patience (for whatever reason) and brake-checked some other vehicle? Was there any collision? How did you guys resolve the road rage? What are the ways to avoid this brake checking?

How would you handle this situation?

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