Why ticket the driver

Let's examine a scenero that happened about two years ago in Illinois where in narrowly escaped a collision:

I was traveling east bound, a west bound car, at dusk, hits the middle ditch, then flips on it's side, slides into a pickup truck ahead of me and spins to the right just barely out of my lane. (a narrow miss)

"Luckily" the pickup truck ahead of me collided with the car spinning it out of my path... if not, I certainly would have collided with the car. I stopped with others... suspecting a drunk driver... turns out the poor woman in the west bound car had a seizure and bit off most of her tounge(never had a siezure before it was a first).

So just who IS accountable? The siezure victim? The guy in the pickup for not forseeing the seizure victims car come across the road and "luckily" colliding with it so the car avoided my loaded truck? Or am I so highly skilled and psychic that I somehow anticipated the event, that i somehow avoided direct involvement(a hit)... Or was I "lucky" that I happened to be just at the right place to narrowly avoid a "accident" where there was no clear blame(certainly the poor woman...didn't know she was going to have a siezure).

hmm?

 

Because I'm bright enough to know that sometimes all the skill in the world isn't gonna keep you out of the accident, That sometimes it just boils down to being lucky enough not to have been in that spot at that moment!

Anyone that doesn't do these things and much more is a bad driver!

I would also say that anyone arrogant enough to think that they can
overcome any situation with "skills" and that the occasional "luck of the draw" doesn't enter into the equation is fooling themself.

This is a "perfect" example of what I'm saying.

 

There is not near enough information provided to make an informed conclusion.

You have no record of the woman's medical history, you have not provided a report on if the pick up truck hit her vehicle because of reaction time, or equipment failure( brakes and or steering), distracted driving, or was it simply unavoidable.


And you have no certainty of anything that could or could not have happened if the pick up was not there.


These are why collisions are investigated. This could have been an accident, we do not have the evidence to examine it as you request, and I am sure insurance companies paid for that determination so I would not bother even if you could provide the evidence.

But it could just as easily be a preventable collision, based on the limited information provided, as an accident.

It could easily be explained as the woman had a medical condition she had been diagnosed with and chose to drive in spite of the risk, or the driver of the pick up truck could have reacted if his brakes had worked properly in time to avoid the impact, or you could have simply reacted appropriately to avoid impact.

Yes that is all supposition. And that is why all collisions, or impacts if you like are investigated. Some extensively, others are more cut and dried.

Or in more truck parlance preventable, and non-preventable.

So to answer your first question yes, there needs to be an assignation of blame. Sometimes that blame will be accredited to chance but the investigation must occur for a ruling.





And to those that believe in luck. Can I buy a bag? How much does it weigh?



Luck is preparation met with opportunity, nothing else.

 

You are wrong on multiple levels here and you are just twisting and turning in any direction that you can in an effort to defend a stupid premise.

Luck is simply chance!

Sometimes, You slow down at a light and the guy in front of you gets clobbered by the drunk that ran the red on his side...That's luck!

Sometimes, you run under an overpass and somebody tosses a rock and hits the car in front of or behind you...That's luck!

I was on I-80 just east of Reno, NV. one morning in 2004 and there was a huge boulder that had been up on the hillside for years that all at once rolled down the hill and hit the guy in front of me, It could just as easily have hit me but it didn't...I was lucky that it wasn't me!

No amount of skill or planning is gonna prevent some things from happening...But according to your logic, It's always gotta be somebody's fault!

Sometimes you just get a little lucky and it doesn't hit you!


That's about as far as I'm willing to go with believing in luck...If you believe in your lucky hat or in four leaf clovers and all of that nonsense, You should probably have your head examined but to assign the term luck to not being in the way when a boulder comes rolling down the hill is probably fairly reasonable.

 

Dispatchers only do what they do because drivers continue to accept what they tell you to do. If drivers refuse to accept what cannot be legally done, then they will discontinue to ask as it would be a waste of their time.

 

That's what compliance reviews are for. However at roadside, who do I make the ticket out to? ABC Trucking dispatcher # 15. Don't think that will work.

 

I don't think the punishments fit the crime alot of times. Simple mistakes drivers are getting fined thousands. Then when DOT gets finished with you, then your company wants their piece of you. Reminds me of the original Airplane movie where everyone was standing in line to beat that nun We barely make above poverty level as it is.
$100 would get my attention any day.

Take a driver who's pushed by dispatch or the shipper. The driver either says no and sits the next couple days or he does what dispatch/shipper says and gets caught. Either way he's screwed out of money. A driver should be able to say no without any ramifications. You punish the companies, the driver wouldn't be put in that position.
It happens everyday to thousands of drivers.

Same with the crack down on just truck drivers. Only a few lives will be saved. Until the gov't cracks down on all drivers the accident rate will remain high.

 

Can anyone say DUI checkpoint? How about TOAD they have been running? I know we like to play the victim but there are more traffic stops made on four heelers than class 8's anyday. And as long as you conduct a business on public roads you will be held to a higher standard.