wkmac said:
Tie,
From the photos with the story it looks like it was daylight but it could also be great lighting too. Checkout the photos and see what you think. The shawdows and light spectrum look more yellowish whereas most rescue lighting uses Metal Halide which is in the white/blueish spectrum instead of the yellowish high pressure sodium. Just a thought.
Wk I think there is an assumption being made here that I am passing judgement simply because I am a management person. I did state that there is a blind spot on the tractor in the area discussed by some here and I also said that you should be able to see the headlights on a car in your blind spot at night. So an objective analysis of my answer would be that I gave one point in the drivers favor and one against. I have investigated way too many sideswipe type accidents to try to pass judgement on this based on what is posted in a news article. The sideswipe type accident is one of the most difficult to investigate. There are way too many variables one has to consider and its definitely not one we can pass judgement on without a thorough analysis of all the facts. I have seen many such accidents where the police would not pass judgement because they did not have enough facts to make a determination. To answer some of the points discussed here.
1) Your right even if I think the picture was taken in the dark I don;t know for sure that the accident occured at night. It does appear according to the article that the accident occured late in the day. Therefore it may have been dark.
Other factors to consider along with day or night are:
a)amount of lighting if dark - a passenger cars lights would be more visible if the road is poorly lit than if there is a lot of street lighting or road construction lighting.Weather at the time of the accident is also a factor and does affect visibility.
b) position of the car in relation to the tractor trailer. In this case it sounds like the car was somewhere around a tractors blind spot at the time of impact.
c) point of impact on both the car and the tractor. I have had cases where I have been able to prove by the impact that our drivers wheel was straight at the time of impact and that the other vehicle was at an angle pointed towards us thus determining who was actually changing lanes.
example I've had a few where the only contact with our vehicle was with the center hub on the passenger side of the tractor and the gouge in the other vehicle was much more prounounced intially and less as it went down the side of the vehicle. that coupled with scraped paint on the front side bumper area of our tractor and no scaped paint behind the passenger wheel can be an indication the other car was angled towards us at impact.
e)many sideswipes occur where a motorist tries to speed ahead of our tractor and pass it either coming off an on ramp or trying to exit. So the position of ramps in relation to the accident can be an important factor.
In addressing the feel factor let me tell you a story of something that happened to one of my drivers who is a good old country boy who does not get excited easily.
This driver was coming down a highway. He is in the middle lane of a three lane highway that is turning into two lanes. The right lane collapses into the center lane as he approaches this point of the highway. Driver says a small white sports car is barreling up the right lane. At one point he sees it and then he loses sight of it. The sports car had actually tried to dart ahead of him. He looks for it and can't see it anywhere. Says he starts feeling a little drag in his front end. No impact or anything. Says he leans forward and sees part of the white sports car tucked up under his right front end (passenger side) The guy had tried to cut in front of him and had actually gotten sucked up under his right front end. He says he calmly backs off on the gas( country boy demeanor) and after a while the car pops loose. Car spins hits the left guardrail. Car spins some more hits the right guard rail..car spins some more straightens out and takes off. He never saw the guy again. He pulled over , called us. We called the police. It was snowing that day and the police never came out so after a couple of hours we told him to keep driving. Very little damage to the tractor and he would never have known the car was there if he hadn't noticed a little drag when he was driving. That motorist was very lucky. If our driver panics and hits the brakes he the other motorist is a dead man.
So in this case there are not enough details to assess fault but it is very possible that the driver could have hit the left rear of the other car caused it to spin off the road and never knew he hit it. However unless the car merged onto the road at that exact moment its also honestly realistic that the driver could have known that car was somewhere in the area of his vehicle if he was doing a good job of checking his mirrors. It would also be fair for me to say that the driver could have seen the other vehicle spin off the road if he was constantly checking his mirrors. Two distinctly different issues here. Did he see or feel the other vehicle impact and could or did he see the other vehicle spin off the road. Those are some of the questions you have to objectively ask in a case like this and to simply assume the managment person is jumping to a management conclusion does not do the process justice. I have agonized over these decisions many times trying to come up with an answer that gives the driver every benifit of doubt without shortchanging the responsibility factor. We owe the driver and the general public a fair shake in this situation. This one will be analyzed to no end. We will probably settle out of court and pay the survivors millions just to keep the case out of court. There is no typical managment answer here. This case has cost a family their mother and we will end up paying heavily for it even if the driver was 100 percent right. All we have to do is step into the courtroom on this case and a jury will find us liable simply because they feel we can afford it financially.