My name is Brad. I was the driver of the car and caravan. Without going in to too much detail, I will explain a bit about what happend. I am 53 years old and am a truck driver holding an MC licence with a lot of experience driving heavy vehicles.
When we left Woody Head, I commented to my wife about the amount of oil on the road. The posted speed limit is 100kph, I travelled at 80kph, through the small town, the speed limit is 50kph, I travelled at 40kph. As I approached the intersection I was breaking as per the conditions of the road and was successfully breaking. At about the last 50 to 30 metres the car started to slide and the ABS started operating and was doing nothing to slow the slide. As I have electronic brakes on the van that where working and adjusted correctly, I attempted to use the manual operation but that had no affect either. I had two choices.enter the intersection travelling straight or try to turn left to avoid crossing the intersection. I decided to turn left. This caused a jack knife of the car and van.now I dont know if that was the right decision or not. BUT If the van hadnt have jack knifed we would have been hit right at the drivers door..I will leave the rest to your vivid imagination Garth and Renae.
I spoke to the truck driver and he said it did not look like I was going fast. Even the police officer who viewed the video said the same. I can assure you I was not speeding and the police report will state that.
The driver behind me had actually telephoned his wife to let her know about the amount of oil on the road. Another witness told the police the same thing. Two more witnesses stated to police they saw a truck leaving Iluka leaking oil out of drums. Perhaps, when the truck had slowed to a stop at the intersection the oil got heavier and this is where the loss of control happened. I dont like to get involved in things like this, but on this occasion as it concerns me, I felt I needed to state the facts.
I can only think of the fact that all were so lucky to be un-injured and no loss of life occurred. I agree with you Garth that elderly drivers should be tested at a certain age. But you have your facts wrong in this case
Brad.
You will find the above comments below the news article on this link -
Brad, you are very lucky mate and your possessions can be replaced, but you and your wife can not!! and that would be devastating to your family. Hope you are well and hope you get back on the horse and back on the road.
Brad, after watching that video, I dont reckon I would worry about buying a lotto ticket, I think you used all your luck then. Same as us, my hubbie fell off the roof of our motorhome 3.5mtrs down, 4 weeks ago, he is getting better by the day, no broken bones, so I reckon we have used up all our luck too. Could've had a broken back/neck or similar.