Team-BHP (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/)

-   Road Safety (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/road-safety/)

-   -   Accidents in India | Pics & Videos (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/road-safety/109249-accidents-india-pics-videos-2444.html)

Different roads have different "speed limits" - eg in KL, for cars it's 100kmph in 4-lane highways & 80kmph in 2-lane highways. But the concept of overtaking lane being the rightmost one applies to all (there's a reason it is said "Overtaking from the left is not right).

As per the first image, the min speed limit on the two rightmost lanes is 80kmph & max speed of 2 leftmost lanes is 80kmph. Now if 4 cars decide to drive abreast on the 4 lanes each at a steady 80kmph, they are perfectly within the rules.

But not only isn't it the correct way to interpret the rules, it will totally negate the purpose of having a 4-lane highway as vehicles will be backed up behind them for miles. If you want to pass them at the allowed 100kmph on the two fast lanes, you cannot. That's precisely the reason why there is an overtaking lane.

After reading about this unfortunate incident, strangely, i'm undecided on singling out one culprit to take entire blame. I can sense folks jumping on me, but, let me explain.

(a) The Doctor was trying to test either car's speed limit, or, his own ability to hit insane speeds. BMWs are can be tempting, but, driving over 70% the speed-limit (assuming this expressway has 140 kmphr limit), atleast at the time of capturing this video proved suicidal. From the video though, conditions seem good enough: almost no traffic, broad well-laid roads, no rains, a powerful car - BMWs, in my opinion (haven't been fortunate enough to experience yet), are built to perform, which means they can accelerate and brake well, and, also are more stable during high speed drives. Questions:
Did the driver get enough opportunity to brake well?
Did the car crash despite/on account of sudden braking?
Was there a sudden unexpected surprise on road?

Yes, Doctor is to be blamed for over-speeding, but, other factors can't be ruled-out.

(b) Was the road fully in a usable condition? Meaning, no diversions, all lanes fully open? If not, NHAI is also to be blamed for allowing partially open roads.

(c ) Is the road-design proper? Expert opinion should be taken. Remember the Cyrus Mistry incident - bad, or, wrong road-design caused the crash. Can this angle be fully ruled-out?

(d) Was the truck parked on wrong-side, or, was it moving in the wrong-side? Had road-rules been followed, possibly crash could be avoided.

All said and done - there's no denying the fact that if the car was within speed-limits, may be driver could have controlled better, or got away with lesser impact crash.
Though driver and occupants are responsible for this horrific incident, it's important to weigh-in other aspects to judge well.

The problem is of statistics.
The probability of finding a disorderly person from the lower strata of society is high whereas probability of finding the same from the highly educated ones is low. Doctors being considered the top of the pyramid in terms of education (although not entirely true), finding one from this section is surprising.
Don’t take it to your heart, the questions being asked to others as well like: How can celebrities endorse Pan masala!?

Please note: I have not made that comment.

Not true. On ORR motorcycles, scooters, autos are not allowed. Goods vehicles are not allowed to carry any passengers etc.
ORR has its own set of rules and of course speed limits.

On ORR, no zig zag movement is allowed. This means if you are in the 100 to 80 km/hr lane, you should continue in that lane even if the vehicle in front is at 80 and you want to drive at 100.

Scenario 1: You are in Lane 2 and at 100, a car is ahead of you at 80, you cannot overtake it. If you overtake it from lane 1, you should not make another move to come back to lane 2.

Scenario 2: You are in lane 1 at 100, you meet a car at 80, you cannot overtake it.

Hence, to respond to your 4 cars at 80, the response from traffic police would be, stay at 80 at a safe distance behind them. You will be 5 mins late to reach the exit, let it be.

Of course, nobody follows it. We just follow speed limit and make as many lane changes by overtaking slower vehicles.

A question to everyone: Have you got stuck behind a slow moving truck at 40km/hr on an Indian highway? what did you do?
1. Kept going behind for eternity.
2. Honked and forced it to move left and then overtook it
3. Honked, it didn't move, and you overtook if from left.
4. Overtook from left (without honking, like you did for 50 other trucks that day)

The rule states, no overtaking from left, across all roads in India. If you ask a policeman, option 1 or max option 2 is allowed and then most of us are sitting in our homes bragging about how we completed our 700 km journey in less than 8 hours. That truck took 1 day.

@mods Please take these posts regarding ORR in a separate thread titled “How you drive on ORR and what is the correct way?"

Brand new Scorpio-N accident from Mumbai. Witnesses say that the driver was overspeeding and lost control. The car rolled over a couple of times and the 4 occupants came out with some injuries. Apparently the car was fresh out of the showroom. Everyone is very eager to comment on the crash test ratings of newly launched cars nowadays. Thanks to these fine gentlemen, they weren't patient enough to wait for the NCAP score so they decided to take matters into their own hands.

https://youtu.be/-jVBSQVqbQw

I went through the website and couldn't see it mentioned anywhere that overtaking is entirely prohibited. It clearly states - "All vehicles which change their speed shall have to go to the lane having the concerned speed range."
That means, if I am in lane 2, the guy ahead of me is at 80, lane 1 is empty and I want to cruise at 90, I can go to lane 1, speed up and then come back to lane 2 to cruise at 90. Is that not how it should be all on roads ?
I think by zig-zag they mean erratic lane changes without checking RVMs and signalling (which the average Indian driver does).
If the absolutely-no-overtaking rule is actually true, I can't think of a reason how it makes sense. Rules across the country should be the same and not vary from state to state or expressway to expressway.

Oh yes, many times.

1. Option 1 if the road is very narrow and there is absolutely no scope of safe overtaking.
2. Option 2 mostly, only if I can see that the truck has enough space to move over and that I have enough space to overtake safely.
3. Option 3 at times (only when there's safe space for overtaking), when the truck driver is stubborn and won't move even after having space.
4. Option 4, never.

Indian highways are the farthest from 'ideal conditions'. If everyone were to follow the strictly-no-overtaking from the left, driving would be even more painful than it is right now.

Zig-zagging isn't the same as overtaking. You are confusing flitting between lanes with legitimate overtaking.

The orr rules link clearly says that you are wrong about Scenario-1 & that overtaking is allowed. See below - just use indicators & overtake. As simple as that. :

All vehicles which change their speed shall have to go to the lane having the concerned speed range and No Zig – Zag movement between the lanes is permitted

All vehicles wanting to change lanes as per the above speeds should do so only after using indicator lights and all precautions shall be taken while changing lanes.

In such a situation, the best practice would be that lane 1 is used for overtaking or the vehicle in that lane travels at the speed limit (100kmph). In the absence of speed limit, lane1 would automatically become overtaking lane.

All the vehicles using lane 2 travel between 80 and 100kmph and use lane1 for overtaking.

Else on higher traffic days one would be stuck behind vehicles traveling at 80kmph on both lane1 and lane2.

Brothers, we are trying to see something which does not exist.
If I am tired of cruising at 100 and want to slow down, I use indicator and move to the lane 3 or 4.
Same is otherwise true, like I was driving at 60 in lane 4 but now I have got a call and had to rush, I use indicators and move to lane 2 or 3.

If anyone of you use twitter, please ask Cyberabad police. I dont use Twitter or Facebook.

One thing is for sure, I was doing it wrong all this while. Either I have to follow someone and keep following until my exit comes (provided he is in 80 to 100 range) or I have to drive in lane 2 most of the times (as most of you have pointed out) and overtake and come back to lane 2.
I tried it today and it was fun! Not as bad as I was expecting(that I have to keep jumping lanes to maintain 100) But yes, had to overtake many vehicles on the lane 1 as they were below 100 and I was at 100. If I had honked they would have said What!? Three lanes are empty and you are honking and pushing me away from lane 1 when I am cruising at 80? This is where I thought that overtaking is not allowed on ORR. You enter, pick the lane which has your speed range. If there is a vehicle in front, keep following it. :thumbs up

Police are busy trying to trace the poor lorry driver. What is the fault of the trucker? The road was divided both ways due to work in progress on the other side. The entire blame must lie on these idiot speed freaks. Actually, the container truck driver and the owner must sue for damage and negligence.

Other factors on the road are EXACTLY the reason why no sane person will touch 230 kmph on a public road.

Road design caused the Cyrus Mistry crash?? An inefficient, incapable driver with poor driving skills. Just do not feel like blasting her anymore as she herself is recovering mentally and physically and will repent lifetime.

As per this video they were going at 230kmph, not sure its the same accident but description matches
https://www.instagram.com/reel/CjzdI...d=MDlmYmQ2NmI=

Police party obliterated. I don't know what is safe and what is unsafe in our country.

Graphic content.

https://youtu.be/3f_q_ZTYQnw

Very sad. I don't get why our police stand in the middle of road without high visibility jackets.

The barriers are also hard to see at night.

Very unfortunate. However, another thing to observe is that Police is having barricades in middle of the road and at night times the visibility is already poor. Such barricades are just not visible till the last moment. Some marking that there is a check post ahead will help others slow down. Let me share one particular incident, during Diwali 2020 at night time I was driving to my native place 165 kms from Vadodara. As it was Diwali time, a lot of checking was happening on highways. I was doing usual 90-100 kmph cruise and all of a sudden barricades appeared. Truck were stopped and many trucks didnt have functioning tail lights, forget under run protection bars. Fortunately I could brake in time. High visibility jackets are a must for officers who have to work at night on highways. Am not saying that the truck driver isn't at fault or is at fault in the video you have shared. But just indicating how unsafe it is for the officers and why planned check posts would resolve these sort of situations.

Read more - https://www.thenewsminute.com/articl...ccident-169053

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y92nc0eoq2U

If you slow down the video and watch it, you can see another white vehicle entering the main road suddenly and to avoid hitting it, the Dzire in which Vava Suresh was travelling, drove into the other lane, thereby colliding with the KSRTC bus. The fact that he had injuries on his face seems to point out that he wasn't wearing a seat belt. :disappointed