car crash

mollycat

gazo1 wrote: »

so if your on a motorway and the fog becomes so thick that you cant see anything in front of you, your all right to come to a complete stop in the fast lane. And then the poor sod who hits you from behind will be responsible.

Yep, thats right, if you hit something because you're driving too fast to stop in time, it's your fault.

Instead of inventing silly scenarios to prove apoint, why not just accept your wife was in the wrong...?

gazo1

thanks for all the responses. I suspect there will be a whiplash claim sooner rather than later. It just grates on me because I have been driving for 20 years without accident, and consider myself a good driver but in the situation I dont think I would have done anything differently, as she said, she had my kids in the back and didnt want anyone to hit her from behind, I believe she really meant this because she said as soon as the accident happened, she pulled in front of the crashed car so no one would drive into the rear end of our car and hurt our children.

darich

Wasn't there a hard shoulder to use as an "escape"?
Or another lane?

If your wife couldn't stop in time then she wasn't driving to take account of the conditions.
As someone already said, it's her fault and she may end up with a "driving without due care and attention" charge.

Your arguement would only hold water if it was normal to drive in complete darkness with no lights and not be to blame when you crash. Effectively it's what your wife has done - she's driven when she can't see where she's going.

Harsh but true I'm afraid.

anewman

Plenty of times I've driven on the motorway and traffics come to a complete stop. There was no doubt also the option to change lanes and avoid the smoke.

Unfortunately whatever you think about the merits of whether the other person is to blame or not, it's black and white in the view of the insurance companies so I'd just begrudgingly accept it, as otherwise your wasting your own time and money. This is why insurance scamsters aim to get people to go into the back of them, as insurance companies ordinarily pay out. If you have genuine reason to believe you have been scammed then inform the insurance company of this. (I guess this is not the case though).

gazo1 wrote: »

as she said, she had my kids in the back and didnt want anyone to hit her from behind, I believe she really meant this because she said as soon as the accident happened, she pulled in front of the crashed car so no one would drive into the rear end of our car and hurt our children.

If you need to come to an abrupt stop on the motorway stick the hazards on for a bit to let following cars know you're slowing down. If they go into the back of you it's their fault. I really hate those idiots that follow you closely then traffic comes to a complete stop, you can brake in time but because they're not paying attention or something and worried they'll go into the back of you treat you to a blast of their horn :mad:

gazo1

Well, I was going to ballistic at the insurance company tomorrow, but I dont think I'll bother. My son had been asking my wife to crash the car for ages, since playing on car games on the xbox360. He said after the crash "I didn't like that".

anewman

gazo1 wrote: »

Well, I was going to ballistic at the insurance company tomorrow, but I dont think I'll bother. My son had been asking my wife to crash the car for ages, since playing on car games on the xbox360. He said after the crash "I didn't like that".

Not relevant but to lighten the mood... I settled for asking my dad if I could drive the car when I was about 5. He let me sit on his lap and hold the steering wheel as he controlled the pedals up the driveway (lived in a nice house on a farm at the time), and he said don't go over that brick, which I ended up doing, lol.

Think I was about 8 when I managed to lock his keys in the car making sure all the doors were locked, sadly the keys were also in the car.

gaz_jones

gazo1 wrote: »

so if your on a motorway and the fog becomes so thick that you cant see anything in front of you, your all right to come to a complete stop in the fast lane. And then the poor sod who hits you from behind will be responsible.

What would be safer......Coming to a complete stop on the motorway or driving through something you can't see?

If she was worried about stopping on the carriageway she should have pulled over to the hard shoulder.


As for the smoke coming out the back of the other car, is she sure it wasn't a turbo diesel putting its foot down? They normally kick a fair amount of crap out the back.

davidjwest

I don't think you're supposed to stop on the motorway and if you do have to then you should use the hard-shoulder if your vehicle develops a fault. Personally I wouldn't have driven into a cloud of smoke without knowing what was in front of my but equally the other driver was partly at fault, assuming he did indeed come to a stop for no apparent reason. If the car wasn't roadworthy it shouldn't have been on the motorway in the first place. Driving a car that is emitting a lot of smoke is also illegal, if it is considered to be a danger to other road users.

Chippy_Minton_2

gaz_jones wrote: »

What would be safer......Coming to a complete stop on the motorway or driving through something you can't see?

I thought the answer to that would be obvious given what's happened.

Stop where others can clearly see and avoid you or drive into something you can't see then the back of another car.

Guess what most would choose?