Had a close call, dangerous Junction

Stinicker

Got a bad fright today through no fault of my own. I was travelling behind a rental car today on the R569 from Kenmare to Killarney in Kerry. I caught up with him about three kilometres from the Junction of the R569 and N22 main Cork-Killarney road.

This is the junction in question.

Anyway I was in no particular hurry to overtake him and held behind in the hope he might be turning off in the opposite direction to myself. Although he was a frustratingly slow and poor driver doing about 55-60km/h and he being a rental I wasn't in any hurry and there is no real safe place to overtake anyway. Whenever I see a rental I automatically show them respect as I know they can be dodgy and having driven a rental on the other side myself I know what its like to be in a foreign country etc.

Anyway we both arrived at the junction and both of us were turning left towards Killarney. We both indicated and he proceeded to turn left, there was a car coming so he held back and once it had passed he went for it. After about 7 or 8 metres and literally within two seconds a massive lorry approached from the right hand side doing at least 115-120km/h as traffic comes down from the county bounds at a frenetic pace.

Once the car was within the lorries sight the lorry put the headlights on him and the poor dummy stalled the car with fright as I reckon he'd taken off in second gear. My jaw was now on the floor and some instinct made me duck in fear. To make matters worse another car was in the ghost island turning into the R569 and only for his quick thinking I am pretty sure I'd have witnessed a fatal road accident. The fella in the ghost island spotted the lorry inbound at high speed and the dopey tourist driver struggling and gunned his own car out of the way into the east bound lane for Cork (luckily there was no cars coming) and the lorry and lemmings tailgating it managed to squeeze around the stalled rental car in the ghost island.

I was still in my junction speechless at after witnessing such a close call, I am certain that both the tourist, ghost island car and lorry driver would all have been killed as the lorry would have ploughed through both cars, jack-knifed and gone off the bridge to a 100ft drop into the river. I myself just got a fright but I'm sure the tourists browned the underpants and the lorry driver probably too.

This junction is so dangerous because of its short visibility, once you commit to going you have to get up to speed so fast because traffic from behind appear in your rear view mirror like a shot out of a gun, add in a bad driver and slow acceleration like today and you have a perfect recipe for disaster. I always sink the shoe at this junction because they are on top of you so fast.

If a crash did happen I'd hold the lorry driver responsible as he was going too fast to stop and the junction is signposted and there is rumble strips back along to slow the approaching traffic from the right and yet they barrel down on top of the junction at speeds of up to 130km/h regularly for cars and there is never a speed check or anything and I reckon that this sort of incident happens there nearly everyday and there have been several accidents there in the past.

I held back for at least 15 seconds afterwards to allow the tourist to drive off and not put pressure on him, and he pulled into the hard shoulder down the road about 400 metres from the junction no doubt very frazzled by the whole thing.

So what is your most dangerous junction? and have you witnessed any close call (or been part of) something before?

Dun

The Caw Roundabout is infamous, it has three lanes for most of it, and serves as the start/end of the Foyle Bridge heading to Donegal or Derry Cityside, Coleraine/Limavady, and the main road towards Belfast via the main out-of-town shopping area, so it's really busy. I've been witness to too many people being stupid on normal roundabouts, but they get even worse on this one. People seem to have this stupid idea that you have to enter a dual carriageway road on the outside lane, and do all sorts of stupid straying over the lanes to get ready for it. I've seen the results of two crashes on it from exactly that.

CiniO

Why would you held lorry driver responsible.
First of all it's very very unlikely he was doing anything over 90km/h as this is the speed that all lorries are limited.
Secondly, he was on main national road. How could he expect that there will be someone emerging from the side road just to stop in the middle of lane straight in front of him?

In my opinion in case described by you, 100% fault would be at the other driver (tourist) side.

Something similar happend to me a while ago.
I was driving a bus on very narrow road (just about that wide to pass bus and a car - max 4.5m wide). Lady approached from little side road on the left. She was intending to turn right (towards me) She looked left (nothing there), she looked right (bus coming but far enough to go) so she emerged into main road. I didn't slow down, as she was far enough to finish the manouver before we had to pass each other. Then suddenly, she probably realised there was bus coming, and she stalled in the middle of the road facing towards me, leaving me not more than 1.5m spread of road to pass her. At this stage I was too close to stop, so I had to go left that much, that over one metre of bus was outside the road on the grass. Luckily nothing happened.

maddladd

Came across a bad accident at this junction monday evening of august bank holiday just gone, three cars written off completely, a host of ambulances and garda cars present, didn't hear of any fatalities thankfully. I still believe it is driver behaviour which causes most accidents I do a lot of driving for work and the amount of assholes I see overtaking cars dangerously in front of me only for me and other cars to catch up to them at the next junction is unreal, thankfully the fatality stats are going in the right direction the last few years but it's unbelievable why driving is not a mandatory leaving cert subject.

Stinicker

maddladd wrote: »

Came across a bad accident at this junction monday evening of august bank holiday just gone, three cars written off completely, a host of ambulances and garda cars present, didn't hear of any fatalities thankfully. I still believe it is driver behaviour which causes most accidents I do a lot of driving for work and the amount of assholes I see overtaking cars dangerously in front of me only for me and other cars to catch up to them at the next junction is unreal, thankfully the fatality stats are going in the right direction the last few years but it's unbelievable why driving is not a mandatory leaving cert subject.

The N22/R569 junction or the one near Derry as pointed out by Dun?

-Corkie-

Thats a dangerous junction allright but the truck would not have been doing the speed you presumed as Cinio said. The rental drivers are a nightmare though in fairness.

maddladd

Yeah the Kilgarvan/Kenmare road off N22, I was coming from Killarney and was stuck in traffic for 5-10 minutes thought it was a checkpoint until I got closer, plenty of shook looking people on the hard shoulder didn't hear much more about was just passing through.

dr.fuzzenstein

And check out the donuts on the main road:
http://maps.google.ie/maps?ll=51.981938,-9.313973&spn=0.000745,0.002747&t=h&layer=c&cbll=51.981997,-9.313976&panoid=R8x7i_ygBDcVr_gnoK8m6w&cbp=12,60.27,,0,5.86&z=19

And it just goes to show that it is safer to put your foot down when joining a main road, dawdling along will get you killed.

langdang

Stinicker wrote: »

I always sink the shoe at this junction because they are on top of you so fast.

The only way to deal with this junction, and many others - get up to the normal speed of the road ASAP. Completely alien concept to a lot of "oh but slow is safe" people.

There's a spot coming from Ballinhassig in Cork that dumps you out into the climbing lane on a corner. You're coming up an incline to get onto the road, visibility is poor, both lanes usual busy because some spacer has built up 3 miles of cars behind him by dawdling, and they finally get the chance to pass him out.
Bless yourself and FLOOR it once the way is clear - there's only a few seconds before someone comes around the corner...

challengemaster

I honestly think a lot of Irish drivers don't understand what the accelerator actually does

nogoodnamesleft

CiniO wrote: »

Why would you held lorry driver responsible.
First of all it's very very unlikely he was doing anything over 90km/h as this is the speed that all lorries are limited.

Not strictly true. Irish trucks are known in contential europe for commonly exceeding their speed limiter. Speed limiters can also be bypassed and rewired with a toggle switch to enable/disable.

I was once passed on the way to Dublin a few years ago before the motorway was built and I was over taken by a Dutch registered lorry doing well in excess of what my speed was(60mph).

Also from personal experience I used work as a contractor for communication systems aboard merchant maritime vessels. Hence I used have to travel frequently to and from various ports. Was behind a irish registered truck one time and I kept a consistent distance from him to get an estimate on his speed. He was doing a consistent 70mph.

dr.fuzzenstein wrote: »

And check out the donuts on the main road:
http://maps.google.ie/maps?ll=51.981938,-9.313973&spn=0.000745,0.002747&t=h&layer=c&cbll=51.981997,-9.313976&panoid=R8x7i_ygBDcVr_gnoK8m6w&cbp=12,60.27,,0,5.86&z=19

And it just goes to show that it is safer to put your foot down when joining a main road, dawdling along will get you killed.

Welcome to the aftermath of the Rally of the Lakes!

Im fairness the gardai were doing there upmost the May weekend seizing cars for having no tax/insurance or NCT.

wildefalcon

CiniO wrote: »

Why would you held lorry driver responsible.
First of all it's very very unlikely he was doing anything over 90km/h as this is the speed that all lorries are limited.
Secondly, he was on main national road. How could he expect that there will be someone emerging from the side road just to stop in the middle of lane straight in front of him?

In my opinion in case described by you, 100% fault would be at the other driver (tourist) side.

Something similar happend to me a while ago.
I was driving a bus on very narrow road (just about that wide to pass bus and a car - max 4.5m wide). Lady approached from little side road on the left. She was intending to turn right (towards me) She looked left (nothing there), she looked right (bus coming but far enough to go) so she emerged into main road. I didn't slow down, as she was far enough to finish the manouver before we had to pass each other. Then suddenly, she probably realised there was bus coming, and she stalled in the middle of the road facing towards me, leaving me not more than 1.5m spread of road to pass her. At this stage I was too close to stop, so I had to go left that much, that over one metre of bus was outside the road on the grass. Luckily nothing happened.

I think the limiters are only fitted to Articulated Trucks, 22 foot trucks are not limited. And, of course, limiters are often bypassed.

CiniO

wildefalcon wrote: »

I think the limiters are only fitted to Articulated Trucks, 22 foot trucks are not limited. And, of course, limiters are often bypassed.

By law limiter has to be fitted to anything GVW over 3.5 tonnes.
Without it won't go through DOE test.

Besides - I drive on Irish roads a lot, and I can't remember anytime any truck doing more than 90km/h.

Monty.

Stinicker wrote: »

If a crash did happen I'd hold the lorry driver responsible as he was going too fast to stop and the junction is signposted and there is rumble strips back along to slow the approaching traffic from the right and yet they barrel down on top of the junction at speeds of up to 130km/h regularly for cars and there is never a speed check or anything

There seems to be a growing number of boy racer truck drivers these days who make no allowances for the fact tourists etc. can and do make errors.
40 ton takes a long time to stop.