You be the Jury.

davmaggs

mudcow007 wrote:

i slid down a hill/ bridge during the snow and ice, i had just about made it up the hill, as i went over the top i seen the road was litrally like a mirror were cars had been polishing the ice by wheelspinning. so my brakes were useless, i left the car in first gear, broke as much as i could.

Ideally you shouldn't be in first gear as you are more likely to spin the wheels.

suzyb

davmaggs wrote:

suzyb wrote:

No ban, no fine but a course on how to drive in adverse conditions

imho every new driver should have to take advanced lessons and learn how to drive on the motorway and in adverse conditions.

Can you point me to who/where those courses are run please?

The driving instructor that taught me does them

Now I think I'll leave the thread, I find some of your opinions silly and unrealistic tbh (and you mine no doubt) so I'm leaving as this is getting too serious a thread.

oh and davmaggs, Second From Disaster ftw

tailwindhome

jedster wrote:

You knew that the road was untreated but you took the car out anyway. That is your responsibility.

Just to chip in a bit more detail.

I would consider myself to be a reasonably competent and safe driver. I've driven about 400,000 miles since passing my test at 17 (I'm now 36). This was my first accident where I was to blame.

I decided to go on this particular road as I *assumed* that this road would be treated as it was a busier road. The snow/ice was broken up along the road and was just packed hard at the approach to the T Junction. Just after the crash I spoke to the fella in the neighbouring house who had contacted Road Service the previous night to request that this stretch be gritted, they refused, he asked that they supply a grit box so he could do it himself, again they refused.

I fully acknowledge that I was to blame for this accident. I thought I was going slowly enough, the laws of physics thought otherwise

rjsterry

Maxticate wrote:

Wallace1492 wrote:

Why did the cyclist die, well because you chose to drive in conditions that were clearly extremely dangerous, and you could not control your vehicle.
t.

Couldn't you just as easily say that the cyclist took to the road in highly adverse weather conditions where they knew that there could be a high possibility of cars being out of control due to black ice? At least one of the posters on here has remarked that they chose not to risk cycling in the snow with the possibility of out of control cars.

It may be that people are advised not to travel unless absolutely necessary but the reality can be quite different. Especially in time where jobs are being cut all over.

I think I was one of them and there were atr least a few more. I've no experience of driving, let alone driving in snow and ice, but a look at stopping distances for dry roads, wet roads and ice shows that unless you have spiked tyres (car or bike) you'll have minimal if any control of the car unless crawling along at walking speed on the flat. as soon as you introduce some speed (5mph+) or a gradient you are asking for trouble - the stopping distances pretty much guarantee that you'll hit something before you stop moving (or fall over if you're on a bike).

Ultimately, I think you shouldn't have been driving on the ice, but so many people in the UK are so unfamiliar with driving in snow and ice that I doubt that many drivers would have acted differently. Hence me staying off icy roads.

Wallace1492

davmaggs wrote:

Wallace1492 wrote:

Driving a car means driving a potential lethal weapon, do people just not realise this?

I think it's because the majority of people realise that they are fallable and that your absolute 100% certainty in your own judgement is something that they don't have and they don't have your skills to never cause an accident.

Anyone who has driven for a few years has had an experience/fright where they would have been at fault, but luckily the gods were smiling that day and nothing serious happened. These people aren't the sociopaths that fill the headlines with obviously dangerous driving, but they are the average person who every so often gets it wrong.

Engineers talk about chains of events that cause failures. It is rarely one thing.

Please do not get me wrong here, I am fallable, I know I could cause an accident, I have had incidents. I understand the consequences though which makes me careful.

What I am saying is that driving a car/vehicle is so inherintly dangerous for those around it, however most people don't treat it as such. We are acustomed to calling them accidents, lapses of concentration, misjudgements, yet they cost hunderds of lifes a year. I think we are too accepting of bad and dangerous driving.

Kieran_Burns

davmaggs wrote:

mudcow007 wrote:

i slid down a hill/ bridge during the snow and ice, i had just about made it up the hill, as i went over the top i seen the road was litrally like a mirror were cars had been polishing the ice by wheelspinning. so my brakes were useless, i left the car in first gear, broke as much as i could.

Ideally you shouldn't be in first gear as you are more likely to spin the wheels.

Depends on the gearing and the engine, but the idea is totally correct - stick it in the lowest gear possible and sit on your feet. You simply do NOT touch the pedals.

(to clarify the 1st point: my 3.0TDi pulls my car along at 10mph with no foot on the accelerator in 2nd gear, down any sort of incline in the snow/ice I would be begging for trouble, so HAVE to use 1st gear. I experience this last Winter when driving on a completely untreated Welsh side road that rapidly turned into a REALLY fun day out, complete with digging the car out of a drift)

antlaff

Taking a stab in the dark but was this the junction??

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=portrush&aq=&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=18.703427,39.506836&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Portrush,+County+Londonderry,+United+Kingdom&ll=55.194407,-6.648531&spn=0.001099,0.002411&t=h&z=19&layer=c&cbll=55.194299,-6.648392&panoid=3--WaB68WweBC-UDFqJYQg&cbp=12,321.55,,0,5

tailwindhome

^

Yep

The semi just across the junction has a new garden wall courtesy of my insurance company.

mybreakfastconsisted

MMMMMMM. The trouble with hypotheticals is that there may be an agenda behind them. The scenario doesn't strike me as likely, what's the cyclist doing as the car slides toward him or her, holding their hands up and screaming as the car slides toward them, like the security guard in Austin Powers?

I can't remember any fatality caused in circumstances like this, but, for the sake of argument, what punishment would you impose on a driver, on a clear day, driving at speed, who fails to see a cyclist after overtaking other vehicles, smashes into them from the rear and and kills them?

Verdict: Accidental Death.

CPS Action: Nothing whatsoever:


http://www.readingcyclingclub.com/node/321

This is a real case, Anthony Maynard was killed, the driver stated "I didn't see him" and nothing happened. An innocent cyclist is killed in clear driving conditions, and a jury doesn't get to decide what happened.


No charges, no fine, no points, no custodial. Nothing.

tailwindhome

mybreakfastconsisted wrote:

MMMMMMM. The trouble with hypotheticals is that there may be an agenda behind them

You could discuss the scenario as outlined

The incident was real and I've described it as best I can. It was just luck that there was no one on the pavement, no cyclist in the road or no one driving from either direction at the time.

Or you could Crtl+C, Crtl+V everyone else into submission.

antlaff

TailWindHome wrote:

^

Yep

The semi just across the junction has a new garden wall courtesy of my insurance company.

Yeah MrB's house - wall ready to fall before you hit it - nightmare junction though over the winter - i live up the hill, the wife refused to drive down it and as such the kids had to walk to school through the winter!!

antlaff

Got to say though - accident it might be but you are driving a 2ton killing machine and must be capable of controlling it in all circumstances, so guilty of death by reckless driving in my opinion.

tofu21

just to complicate things:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/4596500.stm

Pufftmw

davmaggs wrote:

suzyb wrote:

No ban, no fine but a course on how to drive in adverse conditions

imho every new driver should have to take advanced lessons and learn how to drive on the motorway and in adverse conditions.

Can you point me to who/where those courses are run please?

http://www.donpalmer.co.uk/donpalmer.htm

& for ICE driving

http://www.donpalmer.co.uk/icedriving.htm

Recommended - he is a master

CiB

davmaggs wrote:

suzyb wrote:

No ban, no fine but a course on how to drive in adverse conditions

imho every new driver should have to take advanced lessons and learn how to drive on the motorway and in adverse conditions.

Can you point me to who/where those courses are run please?

You can learn down any country lane when the weather is bad. Go out when it snows and find out what it feels like to drive in snow & ice, and get a feel for how your car reacts to different inputs at different speeds. It's not rocket science, driving much more slowly & smoothly and having to anticipate potential & real hazards instead of relying on the ABS to bring everything to a halt when necesary. And as a bonus the more cars that use the roads the less of a problem the snow is. Better to do that and find out what it's like at your own pace, rather than having your first experience of snow & ice being the one that kills you, or some other poor sod.

It's really noticeable how many of you want to jump down OP's throat and brand him a danger, a potential killer worthy of points on the licence, needing to go on a course etc. His description states clearly that the road speed was only about 15mph on (was it?) packed snow & ice. That sounds pretty sensible. It sounds to me like one of those things. No-one was hurt, shrug shoulders, pay for new wall.

In the hypothetical event of a cycle having been killed, nothing changes. Driver was being cautious, a combination of circumstances combined to cause this event. You can no more blame the driver for being out in a lethal weapon than you can blame the cyclist for being out on a bike in such awful conditions.

Jay dubbleU

I don't think 'I didn't mean to' is an acceptable defence

walkingbootweather

In case it hasn't yet been said.....

....."I'd just blame Wiggle"

davmaggs

CiB wrote:

You can learn down any country lane when the weather is bad. Go out when it snows and find out what it feels like to drive in snow & ice, and get a feel for how your car reacts to different inputs at different speeds.

my point (lost in black and white) is that bar driving in such conditions then you can't get the experience and they are rare in cities like London so most people rely on assumptions about what to do when setting off down the road (idiots aside). Suggestions about more training are therefore impractical unless you are massively keen.

I for one support the OP, and concur that he is fortunate that no-one was on the pavement and that random bit of luck is what makes the difference. Other beligerant posters on here would probably want him flogged, or worse make him read a thousand forum entries pasted off selective Google stories.

snailracer

CiB wrote:

...
It's really noticeable how many of you want to jump down OP's throat and brand him a danger, a potential killer worthy of points on the licence, needing to go on a course etc. His description states clearly that the road speed was only about 15mph on (was it?) packed snow & ice. That sounds pretty sensible. It sounds to me like one of those things. No-one was hurt, shrug shoulders, pay for new wall.

In the hypothetical event of a cycle having been killed, nothing changes. Driver was being cautious, a combination of circumstances combined to cause this event. You can no more blame the driver for being out in a lethal weapon than you can blame the cyclist for being out on a bike in such awful conditions.

The perception of risk changes with time. I think the general public has become desensitized to the risks of driving. From wikipedia:

"The 1865 act required all road locomotives, which included automobiles, to travel at a maximum of 4 mph in the country and 2 mph in towns and have a crew of three travel, one of whom should carry a red flag walking 60 yards (55 m) ahead of each vehicle. The 1896 Act removed the need for the crew of three and raised the speed to 14 mph."

nation

FWIW, in civil liability terms a person that loses control of their vehicle because they slid on ice is negligent for failing to drive to the conditions.

You also can't hold the local authority liable for not having gritted it, because although they have a statutory duty to keep the roads clear and safe to drive on, the courts have always recognised that there are practical limitiations to this. As such, a general duty to keep the roads clear doesn't imply a specific duty to keep any particular road clear at any given time.

It's the same reasoning that's behind the fact you can't sue the police for failing to prevent your house being burgled.

davis

I'm with CiB (I think; his interpretation of my opinions might differ from my perception of his)

It was an accident. You were being careful, but sometimes bad stuff happens to good people. You can play the "what if" game all you like, but it won't help (it certainly doesn't help after someone's died either; they're still dead).

Living has risks. Accept it. Sometimes those risks are from other peoples' (in)action, but that's just life. You almost certainly do it to others. Keep calm, and carry on.

If you do want to learn, there are skid control/advanced driving courses available; they're really not hard to find. The one that I went on gave me one single definite piece of advice: if you start to slide, don't touch the pedals. That's the sum total of the advice from a full afternoon.

I got far, far more experience of car control on deserted wet roundabouts with crap cars with skinny tyres with a pretty good understand of physics (that, and the "circle of grip" idea from the game Gran Turismo)


Edit: s/definitive/definite/