Car crash on Autobahn

Bobo78

I presume that the driver and passengers of the BMW x3 got serious whiplash from the hit.
Wouldn't like to be in their shoes now

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=SK7mQNO7PFw

paddy147

At least he knows that his windscreen wipers were working....(couldnt resist it)

jackofalltrades

If he pulled back into the right lane after overtaking, then he would have seen the obstruction earlier and might have had a chance to brake or use the hard shoulder.

Stinicker

He had an enough time to brake, poor judgement really.

CiniO

Stinicker wrote: »

He had an enough time to brake, poor judgement really.

Too fast for such traffic. He just wasn't looking ahead far enough.

Supergurrier

Why didn't he brake earlier.

Also typical woman screaming ar a crucial time where the driver needs to concentrate to save both their lives.

Justin10

The women screamed after the car had hit the Citroen.

Alanstrainor

Supergurrier wrote: »

Why didn't he brake earlier.

Also typical woman screaming ar a crucial time where the driver needs to concentrate to save both their lives.

To be fair, the only scream I heard was when the ****e was hitting the fan, a moment before impact. I'd probably squeal like a little girl if I was in the passenger seat too.

Driver was silly not to brake sooner or harder.

CiniO

Supergurrier wrote: »

Why didn't he brake earlier.

.

It's always hard to judge from dashcam when exactly driver started braking, but IMO he was at full pedal to the floor even before he passed red van with trailer.

Which was still too late at that speed.

renofan

Very bad observation skills from the driver. At that speed the driver should be well aware of whats going on ahead. I can't understand why he didn't see the traffic or hit the brakes.

Bobo78

To be fair he was driving very fast and there was small bend from which you couldn't see that there was traffic queue and especially driving at that speed when it's definitely too late.

urajoke

CiniO wrote: »

Stinicker wrote: »

He had an enough time to brake, poor judgement really.

Too fast for such traffic. He just wasn't looking ahead far enough.

Too fast for his driving abilities more like and too fast for the road, the traffic was light but he was belting it coming up to that bend leaving himself no chance even if he braked slightly earlier he would still have shunted the cars in front.

copacetic

Alanstrainor wrote: »

To be fair, the only scream I heard was when the ****e was hitting the fan, a moment before impact. I'd probably squeal like a little girl if I was in the passenger seat too.

Driver was silly not to brake sooner or harder.

Agreed, in fact if she had screamed earlier the ****wit might have paid attention to what was in front of him...

mickdw

Even with the bad camera view, it would appear that at about 39 or 40 seconds on the video, the driver should have been killing the speed as there was clearly traffic in his lane. Much more visible to the driver than what we can see on the video too.

Stinicker

I've driven on the Autobahn a few times and you need to have a sort of tunnel vision, and allow massive distances. It could have ended much worse I suppose. He had enough room between 43 - 44seconds to swerve between the caravan and the green truck as there was an off ramp lane there. Hindsight is great and disaster could have been averted but it wasn't.

Pottler

Tool. Too fast and yet too slow. These are the types of drivers I fear most, the overconfident ones who are actually crap. Saw much the same thing on the M50/Malahide road interchange, driver flew up flat out, never copped the traffic had stopped and cut the van beside mine literally in half. Like a bomb going off. Small mercy to me was that she hit a van and not a passenger car as any rear seat passengers would have been obliterated.

tossy

Tunnel vision is the worst thing you could have on the autobahn.

You need to be on the ball all the time.

He was driving to fast for the conditions near the end of the video,fine at the start.

He reacted too late.

He suffered a bit of target fixation and didn't take the gap.

It's very easy to point all that out sitting on my couch with the benefit of youtube,hope all involved were ok.

harry21

CiniO wrote: »

It's always hard to judge from dashcam when exactly driver started braking, but IMO he was at full pedal to the floor even before he passed red van with trailer.

Which was still too late at that speed.

Agreed. I reckon he started braking at 39 second or so. Had about 150 yards of braking but still didn't stop. Must have been doing well over the ton.

harry21

And looking at it again, he could have duck in to the right between the trucks and onto the hard shoulder in the last second or so before impact.

Iwannahurl

The last comment on YouTube says something along the lines that the driver was sitting in the back eating a hot-dog, with the car on cruise control...

Matt Simis

Iwannahurl wrote: »

The last comment on YouTube says something along the lines that the driver was sitting in the back eating a hot-dog, with the car on cruise control...

Who was steering then?

Alanstrainor

Matt Simis wrote: »

Who was steering then?

The pet dog obviously...

Cuddlesworth

Matt Simis wrote: »

Who was steering then?

The dog?

harry21

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

The dog?

Thats ruff!

paulmclaughlin

Jellicoe

He was obviously day dreaming and thought the left hand lane was moving faster than it was.

Don't know why he didn't try to nip off to the right between the two green trucks and try getting stopped on the hard shoulder on the right.

Bobo78

I d say it's because he was driving too fast in order to be able to pull to the right safely enough. Read that he was driving well over 160 kph.
And if that dog was driving that car who was braking then?

Mycroft H

Wow that's some silly driving there. From 34 seconds he had the traffic in view and should have been hard on the anchors.

What speed do yous reckon he hit the c5? 40kmh?

CiniO

BX 19 wrote: »

Wow that's some silly driving there. From 34 seconds he had the traffic in view and should have been hard on the anchors.

What speed do yous reckon he hit the c5? 40kmh?

Knowing that most dashcams have about 120 degrees view, and therefore tend to show objects further than they really are, I reckon it could be more than 40km/h.

Tallon

I'm confused by the slip road and gap comments

At a tonne, the Last thing you wanna do is swerve in anyway

And it looks like he wasn't paying attention at all, so he just gave it anchors and hoped for the best

corktina

fast lane ftw

Iwannahurl

Matt Simis wrote: »

Who was steering then?

Lost in translation.

BigEejit

Its notoriously hard to spot in cameras like this small changes in speed, but he looked like he didn't brake until way too late. I think he was doing more than 40km/h at the time of impact, really hard to calculate from that video though.

Matt Simis

Iwannahurl wrote: »

Lost in translation.

Ah right!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q27YiPRiewg

Wonder how would the adaptive cruise control systems handle this.. just how far ahead and what speed can they read obstructions and apply the brakes?

H3llR4iser

It's fairly safe to say that he (she? The account name is a woman's) started to brake when the car was almost alongside the red van; If you listen carefully, you can hear the wind noise starting to go down just after that and the car starts fishtailing.

Of course the incompetent people will say rubbish such as "200km/h, what do you expect?", but the thruth is that that specific driver's skill didn't allow for the speed. More situational awareness, attention and caution would have avoided the collision. At 0:37, it was already clear he/she was going to hit the preceeding traffic...