Car Damage from Road Debris

LeopardPlant

Hi, could anyone please offer any advice on the following: whilst travelling at night, my car hit a large rock lying on the road which caused two burst tyres and damage to the front suspension. The amount to repair came to £460 which is under my insurance excess so cannot claim but I am wondering if there are any compensation avenues I could go down. All I can find online is how to claim for pothole damage which this is not. I am in Scotland just to note.
Thank you.

RichardD1970

Who are you going to claim from?

Who's negligence is responsible for you hitting a rock large enough to do that sort of damage to your car?

facade

Can you prove who put the rock there?

There has to be negligence for you to have a claim (no blame, no claim).

If it was put there by vandals, you need to identify them and claim against them. If it fell off an identified lorry then you claim against the driver, if it slid down a mountain, then you have to prove it was negligence on the part of the landowner.

If there are signs up warning that bits of mountain may fall down, then there is an element of self-blame, and the local authority will only be negligent if the rock was reported a while ago and they didn't move it, or if their schedule for checking for fallen rocks is inadequate, or they haven't followed it.

AdrianC

LeopardPlant said:

whilst travelling at night, my car hit I drove into a large rock lying stationary in the road

Why didn't you see it in the light of your headlights (assuming the road wasn't streetlit)?

LeopardPlant

Understand all your comments, thank you. Just to add - it was a country road so no streetlights. The rock was lying towards the side of the road and the headlights lit it up too late to stop - swerving would have meant hitting oncoming traffic. Reading all comments, I do now see that fault lies with me. 

Ebe_Scrooge

LeopardPlant said:

 the headlights lit it up too late to stop

Not meaning to be critical here, more a useful bit of advice.  When I was learning to drive - many many years ago! - one "golden rule" that was drummed into me was "always make sure you're able to stop in the distance you can see".  Most pertinent perhaps in cases where it's foggy, where you would drive much much slower than you would normally.  But I would say equally applicable to driving at night on unlit roads.  Particularly on country roads - if you hit something like a deer at any kind of speed, it'll make a right mess of your car.

BOWFER

AdrianC said:

LeopardPlant said:

whilst travelling at night, my car hit I drove into a large rock lying stationary in the road

Why didn't you see it in the light of your headlights (assuming the road wasn't streetlit)?

MSE's chief victim blamer strikes again!
You may know him from other recent hits such as:
"why didn't you see the speed camera that was covered with foliage" 

BOWFER

LeopardPlant said:

 Reading all comments, I do now see that fault lies with me. 

It doesn't, really.
It's just the most holier-than-thou, victim-blaming forum I've ever come across.

Ebe_Scrooge

BOWFER said:

AdrianC said:

LeopardPlant said:

whilst travelling at night, my car hit I drove into a large rock lying stationary in the road

Why didn't you see it in the light of your headlights (assuming the road wasn't streetlit)?

MSE's chief victim blamer strikes again!
You may know him from other recent hits such as:
"why didn't you see the speed camera that was covered with foliage" 

BOWFER said:

LeopardPlant said:

 Reading all comments, I do now see that fault lies with me. 

It doesn't, really.
It's just the most holier-than-thou, victim-blaming forum I've ever come across.

There's a good book I can recommend by Dale Carnegie .....

BOWFER

Ebe_Scrooge said:

There's a good book I can recommend by Dale Carnegie .....

The Art of public speaking
Read it.

boobyd

BOWFER said:

LeopardPlant said:

 Reading all comments, I do now see that fault lies with me. 

It doesn't, really.
It's just the most holier-than-thou, victim-blaming forum I've ever come across.

Surely fault lies with the driver? What % would be all factors from too fast, etc