I had to post this....Really Bad Accident...Wake up call to all of us.

[dmccarty]

...

Even deciding to floor it can save your life, as once happened to me when I was stopped at a red light. I happened to look in the rearview mirror and saw a semi coming up behind me with smoke coming off his tires and his trailer starting to jackknife. I floored it and blew through the light, causing him to miss me by what seemed like a fraction of an inch as we both went through the light rather quickly.

Spending quite a few years in South FLA you learn to drive in REALLY bad rain. We had a rain storm last year that reminded me of the downpours that were common in South FLA. What was so dangerous about these heavy rain is that sometimes people would just stop in the road. Even pulling off the road is dangerous because of the traffic behind you.

If I have to pull of the side of the road I always look for a long straight away with no hills. If I am in the truck, which has 4x4, I look for an overpass to park BEHIND if the ground looks ok. So many of the bad accidents are from smoke, fog or heavy rain causing traffic to stop or slow down which is not seen by oncoming traffic.

In heavy traffic that suddenly has to slow down, I always watch behind me to see what is happening. A couple of times I pulled off the road to keep from being hit since the oncoming vehicle was not going to stop in time.

So many idiots follow way too close.....

A couple of years ago I was a bit late from leaving work. A sudden rain storm hit. I just got on the highway when the traffic STOPPED. I could see quite a few cars up ahead that had wrecked. It took a good 90 minutes for one lane to clear. As I drove down that one lane, there was carnage for a couple of miles. I lost count of the number of wrecked cars at 40-50. Most of them had been following too closely when a car braked or slowed down. Then boom. Chain reaction crash and there would be 3,4,5, or more cars just stacked up.

That rain storm and bad driving did hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage.

If I had left work on time I would have been in that mess but likely not hit since I put put down the road and try to maintain 3-4 seconds between the car in front of me.

Later,
Dan

 

[dmccarty]

I am a commercial driver and not ten minutes ago posted this on a coworkers FB page:

"Bottom line is the driver will have to live with that for the rest of his life. Slow the flick down people, my clean conscience depends on it."

Yeah, I thought of the truck driver too. If he survived.

Later,
Dan

 

[jymbee]

Is there any more information about the video? Where was it taken? When did it happen? Etc...

The closest I've seen to what seems to be a reliable source was posted on a Russian news site. A rough Google translation from that page (http://www.vladimir.kp.ru/daily/25841.5/2813489/):


Visitors to the Internet in full to discuss an accident that occurred Feb. 24 at the village Omutischi Petushki area. Off-road "Nissan" wagon collided with a counter: pickup shattered into small pieces, the driver was killed instantly. Video of the accident, written subsequent to the DVR, "Nissan" car traveled around almost all the online forums. "Tin" - so dubbed some of its users. Official sources of information, in particular, the Office of Traffic Police of the Vladimir region expressed not so emotional.

- February 24, about 18 hours and 20 minutes on the 109-kilometer highway M-7 Volga car driver ｫNissan Navaraｻ - Moscow resident born in 1980 lost control and performed on a collision with a motor vehicle "GAZ", - said Mikhail Maslov, an inspector Traffic Police Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia Vladimir region. - As a result, ｫNissan Navaraｻ drove into oncoming traffic and collided with a Freightliner truck and a car "VAZ 21723". From his injuries SUV driver died at the scene. In addition, the driver suffered "Lada." With numerous cut wounds a person was hospitalized. Now the traffic police department investigation Petushki district conducted investigation verification.

- Driver "Nissan" was named Alexander. He was a good guy, an experienced driver. I was driving home to his wife and children - he has two of them ... - A message on one of the sites put a familiar victim. - The funeral will be held February 28 in Balashikha ... For us it is a tragedy ... It's such grief. No one understands how it all could happen. "

 

[Larry Caldwell]

I am just posting this because a friend of mine emailed this link to me to show me just how fast it can happen. I thought by posting this everyone could see how devastating and fast this crash happened and those of you that have young drivers ...it might be good to sit them down in front of your computer and let them see this....just might save their lives...

Vidvir

I had to watch it three times to see everything that happened. It was about 4 seconds from the time the driver drove into the slush and overcorrected until the head-on. I think his air bags popped when he sideswiped the van, you can see the white through the driver's window. He probably couldn't see the semi coming, and may not have even been able to reach his steering wheel.

 

[MasseyWV]

I had to watch it three times

Only 3?

I've lost count of how many times I watched it, while trying to fathom the massive sudden impact and how that vehicle came apart, as if it were made of balsa wood. It's almost unreal, yet all too real.

 

[greasemonkeyok]

Years ago I witnessed the extended-cab PU in front of me cross the median and go head-on into a tractor-trailer carrying an 80k lb load at 70 mph on the Interstate. The PU exploded as in the video, and took out the front axle on the big rig. The only recognizable PU truck part left was the engine block.

It occurred in daylight, 7:00 am, perfect weather and road conditions, but a tire blew out on the PU. No survivors in the PU, and the big rig driver couldn't let his 7-year old daughter come out of the tractor because of the visible carnage. It happened as he was approaching an overpass so there was nowhere the big rig driver could go to avoid the collision.

 

[dmccarty]

Years ago I witnessed the extended-cab PU in front of me cross the median and go head-on into a tractor-trailer carrying an 80k lb load at 70 mph on the Interstate. The PU exploded as in the video, and took out the front axle on the big rig. The only recognizable PU truck part left was the engine block.
...

There was a very bad accident on I40 last year between a semi, a PU, and a couple other cars. There was quite a bit of confusion over who was at fault but the last I read the semi driver was arrested and charged. The semi hit the rear of the PU at a very high speed yet kept on driving. It was hard to tell the PU from the semi. The PU driver died.

Decades ago I saw a small station wagon, I think it was a Toyota, that was hit in the rear by a semi. It looked like a giant had picked up the station wagon and put it rear first into a garbage disposal. The "shredding" stopped just behind the front seats. The semi went off the side of the highway so I think the semi driver was ok. Not sure about the driver of the station wagon. I THINK they might have been ok but if there had been any passengers behind the driver's seat I don't think they could have survived... I hope there were no kids back there....

Later,
Dan

 

[ruffdog]

I grew up on a state highway that was known for bad accidents. One was during similar road conditions as the video when the car lost control in the center slush and was hit by a oncoming semi. We called for help and I went down to help(unfortunately experienced by now). The car was tore in two and one guy was laying on his back in the roadway. I don't remember seeing any injuries but he was shivering really bad. I layed my coat on him to keep him warm and stayed with him till emt's came. I later learned he died.

The jeep doing a head-on with a grayhound bus was very bad too.....the highway is now divided......less people die now.........

 

[ruffdog]

We would be outside working or inside the house and hear tire screeching and would wait for the big bang. Many times we would call the sheriff just from the sound.

 

[Blast Chamber]

We would be outside working or inside the house and hear tire screeching and would wait for the big bang. Many times we would call the sheriff just from the sound.

Just curious, what highway was that?