Safe driving

Brisand · Veteran Member

Safe driving

Desert Dweller · Senior Member

On our travels we've seen lots of setups similar to the one you describe. All accidents waiting to happen.

Ozzie_Traveller · Senior Member

Brisand wrote:
I have recently observed an accident waiting to happen.
In Darwin I observed a two door Prado with a kayak on the roof plus other goods, it was towing a 23 ft Jayco with a twin slide out, on top of this it had two foot extended rear bumper with a domestic air conditioner fitted, plus a tool box, plus a spare wheel, and a bike rack, a disaster waiting to happen. On the road before Lake Argyle this van pulled out of a road stop in front of us and another two vans requiring all three of us to brake and slow down, ... There must be more time given to the towing vehicle combinations, .... Please use common sense.

G'day mate

Yes - as we travel [all of us that is] we will see things that cause us to at a minimum, raise the eyebrows and ask the rhetorical question

18 months ago I stopped for a cuppa at a rest area on the Pacific Hwy near Nabiac, to be approached by a fella who asked "have you seen our bicycles?"
Um - no - what do you mean? I asked

"Well" he said "they were on the back bumper of the caravan when we left home from [Sydney western suburbs] and they are not attached to the van now - in fact the whole bumper bar has gone as well". Where the hell they fell off is anybody's guess, and I could only hope that whomever was behind when they did come adrift was not affected by the debris

Recently I have been camp host at the free-camp at Julia Creek in Qld. One morning I heard the loud & long hoooting of what could have been a ship's fog horn - to look at the highway and see the 5th-wheeler that had departed just beforehand entering the highway at walking speed, and coming up behind - and hooting like mad - a B-Double doing highway speed

The gap between the 2 vehicles was not enough for safety, the 5th-wheeler may have seen the truck by now, but still was struggling to get up to speed, and all in the blink of an eye the B-Double was closing the gap 'real qwik'. I then saw the B-Double overtake the 5th-wheeler ... meaning that the truck was forced to cross the double lines - along a long curved piece of road. Obviously the truckie could see that no-one was coming towards them ... and if there had been, the truck would have had nowhere to escape, and the 5th-wheeler would have been matchsticks & kindling for the next bbq in town

Phil

Yuglamron · Guru

I do not wish to offend anyone.

These are NOT accidents, They are CRASHES caused by people. They have causes and mostly from people who do not know how to drive to the conditions. They ignore the rules and cause crashes.

Very few genuine accidents most are crashes.

Yesterday a Landcruiser saw me coming and still pulled out onto the main road from a side road giving me little choice other than crossing the double line. Only way to avoid hitting the float from behind. Luckily nothing coming the other way.

This vehicle was towing an extremely long horse float.

I pulled into a servo about one K further on and fueled up. The horse float and Cruiser pulled in to fuel up too.

I got a mouthful from the driver about overtaking on double lines.

Flabbergasted. Didn't she realise she had given me no room to brake.

I took a good look at her rig.

Six horses in the float. Not ponies full grown horses. So six horses and a large float. WEIGHT limits exceeded? No mirrors that were capable of seeing down the side of the float.

Two K's over speed limits and you get a ticket. What about the blatantly obvious overweight vehicles out there. All the rest of the stuff that is not safe but never stopped. No, the revenue from speeding is an easy touch. Too hard to fix the other safety issues.

Rant over.

So an accident. No a near miss caused by a person who just wasn't thinking.

hako · Guru

Yuglamron wrote:
I do not wish to offend anyone.
These are NOT accidents, They are CRASHES caused by people. They have causes and mostly from people who do not know how to drive to the conditions. They ignore the rules and cause crashes.
Very few genuine accidents most are crashes.

SNIP

I figured the same as you that they were smashes/prangs instead of accidents but apparently the definition of 'accident' applies to smashes/prangs etc. Maybe there is another word to describe accidents of the sort described in this thread.

Wiki says:

An accident is an undesirable incidental and unplanned event that could have been prevented had circumstances leading up to the accident been recognized, and acted upon, prior to its occurrence.

Regards

Phil C · Guru

I have to agree with everybody on this thread. Accident, Prang, Smash all have the same common denominator. A dill behind the wheel!

Met a bloke at Pt Lincoln on our recent trip. His ute was loaded to the gunnels and the van had all forms of crap and rubbish in it. When he set up his camp (next to us) he unloaded the junk on the ground and then let his dogs take a dump UNDER my caravan... I asked him to remove the dung but he never did. When he left, well thats another story of gross stupidity and neglect, I spotted his tow ball, IT WAS OUT OF ROUND!!! serious prang coming up..

Rant over
PLEASE travel safe and think of others on the road...

Ron-D · Guru

How many Vans have been overtaken by a car while travelling up a hill and said to there partner lucky no one was coming the other way..

Every one of us Eh..

-- Edited by Ron-D on Tuesday 28th of June 2016 07:12:08 PM

Woody n Sue · Guru

Gee Phil C hope you picked up the dogs do and put it in the back corner of his ute over night for him

Bruce and Bev · Guru

there sure are plenty of ****** people out there who should not be driving, irrespective of whether they are in an RV or towing one, or not.

About 6 weeks ago I was in my sons bright red Navara driving through a shopping centre car park. It was a quiet area with good visibility (for a change) and this young guy puts his Hilux into "R" and just accelerates at high speed out of his car park into the side of sons ute. Major damage and it was right outside a Maccas - just as well it wasn't people walking there but a vehicle instead. The other driver climbs out and says "how long have you been there?". "Huh", I said - we were driving past you, not parked.

Then in the same city about 2 weeks later I had my ute backed into another shopping centre car park. Mature aged guy decides he will drive into the vacant bay beside me. I was sitting in my ute and could see he would hit me with his Patrol bull bars. Despite tooting at him and waving through my windscreen he still collided with the front panel of my vehicle. Instead of stopping though, he continued on and scrapped right down the side of my ute until he was parked. He couldn't understand why I was more than a little upset.

About 3 months earlier I was parked in a Coles carpark and another mature aged man drove into the vacant bay in front of me. I was sitting in the car (obviously I hate supermarkets lol) and texting. Suddenly I felt a collision and looked up to see he had hit me. This time a Cruiser with bull bars. He then reversed off me, turned the motor off and proceeded to walk off at a casual pace into Coles. I chased him and made him come back - he couldn't understand that his behavior was not what "normal" people do after a collision. Luckily my nudge bar took the impact and didn't damage the front panel.

What really got me is that both drivers who hit my vehicle were older than 60 ! I thought our generations of oldies were brought up better than that

Bagmaker · Senior Member

At 53, healthy and still good eyesight with a good crash record I am still flabbergasted at MY near miss the other day.
Pulled straight out through a cross road after stopping and looking carefully to the right. And only the right.
Skids, horn, wife sounding too. Fortunately the intersection was not too busy and the affected driver was on the ball.
Jus' sayin', I did the wrong thing and I haven't a clue how.

macka17 · Guru

Happened to me Yesterday.
Pulled out of side street onto (minor) main road.
A Grey car shot past me on outside lane (lucky it was there.)

Older Grey car old bitumen road, road curved slightly. Busy

I DID NOT SEE HIM............And I reckon I'm fairly observant behind the wheel.

Didn't Di give me a blast. But I honestly Didn't see the car.

It blended perfectly with surrounding conditions.

MY FAULT but also conditions come into it.

ALL cars should be bright colours I reckon..

How many times have most of you taken a second look at some vehicles....

Negligence. YES.

Conditions YES.

Avoidable YES.

It happens to all of us.

"Open your eyes dickhead ME.."

-- Edited by macka17 on Wednesday 29th of June 2016 01:59:26 PM

hako · Guru

Bagmaker and Macka17 - you are not the only ones and it is so very easy to do. The approaching vehicle just does not register. What does register is extreme embarrassment.
You take a bit more care after that, till the next time.
Bottom line is that we are getting slack.

Good Luck.

Phil C · Guru

Gday again

I got myself one of these dash cams from flee bay for around $100. My memory is so crap that it will serve to remind me if some idiot cuts me off or has a bingle in front of me. I checked the quality of the video and its rather good, so it gets switched on and stays on for every trip.

There are so many d1ckheads on the road its scary sometimes..

Be well

The Phantom · Guru

I am really teed off now.

Nothing has happened to me.

The Phantom

aussie_paul · Guru

Phil C wrote:
Gday again

I got myself one of these dash cams from flee bay for around $100. My memory is so crap that it will serve to remind me if some idiot cuts me off or has a bingle in front of me. I checked the quality of the video and its rather good, so it gets switched on and stays on for every trip.

There are so many d1ckheads on the road its scary sometimes..

Be well

I have a dashcam that turns on with the ignition.

Aussie Paul. smile

aussie_paul · Guru

The Phantom wrote:
I am really teed off now.
Nothing has happened to me.

The Phantom

Hang in there Phantom, these situations are divided into, those that have had one and those are going to!!! biggrin

Aussie Paul. smile