Team-BHP - Accidents in India

Quote:

Originally Posted by DieselLover (Post 3135564)

I would rather blame the parents of these youngsters who let them out on a long trip. They are all 18-20 yr old and would lack sufficient experience (unless they started driving at an illegal age) and maturity for long drives.

Quote:

Originally Posted by binand (Post 3135605)

Leading to the obvious question, what age or years of driving experience do you reckon is needed for a long drive (which, in four cases, involved sitting in the passenger seats - does that also require experience in your view)?

Quote:

Originally Posted by DieselLover (Post 3135623)

Well, I cannot fix an age as the Govt has already fixed it at 18. But I will not let anyone in my family out on a long drive with a bunch of 18-20 yr old guys or someone with questionable driving skills. No offence to any young drivers here. This is my strictly my personal opinion.

Here is my personal take - There is a big difference between how most 18-19 year olds drive on the highway with their family and how they drive with their friends. The question is really whether it is advisable to let 18 year olds go on a highway trip by themselves, without any supervision from elders?

In my case, my father used to make me drive in highways once I got the license and the first couple of years were filled with advices and comments regarding how I was approaching different situations and the potential risks that I overlooked in some cases. It took at least 2-3 years of driving before I started driving at the 'levels of maturity' acceptable to him. This is something that no one in the car would be aware of if everyone is in the 18-19 group and are relatively new to driving, leading to no one warning the driver in case he is not driving according to the road situation. Moreover, at the age of 18-19, everyone would want to have a go at the wheel and not all would have acquired the highway driving skills yet. It is very easy to get carried away into going at high speeds with a group of youngsters.

In this specific case, the car was driven by someone else at the time of accident and not by the guy who owned the car. So we don't even know how much experience the driver had driving on highways prior to this trip.

Disclaimer: I know the 18-21 age group might be frustrated seeing my reply and are likely to start a big line of arguments but I can't help there. :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by zenren (Post 3137277)

+1 to that. You have to put in a couple of years behind the wheel before you actually become mature enough to understand the finer dynamics of driving. I, for one, had better reflexes when I was 18-19 than I have now but in retrospect I would say I am a safer driver now that I was back then. I think twice before every overtaking manuovere - would back off unless I'm 100% sure I can complete the manuovere safely with plenty of room to spare. This is not what I used to do back then.

At 18-19 years of age, once you get the hang of things, you try to push things upto or beyond the limit without actually understanding the consequences. 15 years ago, the roads were not in such good shape and the vehicles were much less powerful than now and we had much fewer vehicles on the road. In short, we had a better margin of safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by zenren (Post 3137277)

Here is my personal take - There is a big difference between how most 18-19 year olds drive on the highway with their family and how they drive with their friends.

Attributing such behaviour to age is disingenuous. There is a big difference between how anybody behaves in any context if their family is present or not. There is nothing specific to driving, or a particular age group here.

Quote:

Originally Posted by zenren (Post 3137277)

In my case, my father used to make me drive in highways once I got the license and the first couple of years were filled with advices and comments regarding how I was approaching different situations and the potential risks that I overlooked in some cases.

Anecdotal evidence doesn't cut it. In my case, I moved from small town India (Calicut) to the largest metro (Mumbai) alone, when I was 17. Within months of completing 18 years, I had a driving license and my own vehicle - which, within six months, I had driven to Pune - a city then about 170km away via the heavily used (no MPEW then) and trecherous NH4. Overnight (starting from Mumbai at 11PM, reached Pune next mornig around 6AM). I did the same thing again and again - Alibaug, Daman, Lonavla, Nasik... all before I graduated. Two decades on, I am yet to be involved in any kind of road accident.

My point: road accidents are caused by a subset of every demographic that comprises road users. It is a bit hypocritical to blame 18 year olds and tell them to stay off the road.

Quote:

Originally Posted by zenren (Post 3137277)

agree:
I have been on the wheel officially since 3 years now, that makes me 21. Whenever I was given the car for travelling alone even inside the city limits, there was a stare from the parents that we all might have got. Taking the car out in the city alone with friends was a difficult task out then, leave alone highway drives. There was always one or the other uncles, if not my parents accompanying me.
I am now given the vehicle freely, but that is only after my father threw out that young rash driver inside me once and for all. That came only after many many corrections in every action that I took. This makes me proudly say that my way of driving does not differ when with parents of friends, how-much-ever the temptation be.

Quote:

Originally Posted by longhorn (Post 3137342)

+1 to that. You have to put in a couple of years behind the wheel before you actually become mature enough to understand the finer dynamics of driving.

At 18-19 years of age, once you get the hang of things, you try to push things upto or beyond the limit without actually understanding the consequences.

Experience not only comes by driving, it also comes by observing. I remember, I always used to be in the front seat so as I can observe how people drive and their reaction to different types of situations. I believe, that made it a bit easy for me to understand the behavior of traffic on the roads.
Family and friends too play a major role in bringing out the maturity of the person. We have many examples of aged drivers driving like maniacs on our roads and that all with loads of experience behind them. It would not be fair station that a person would mature only after a couple of years behind the wheel or some number of miles piled up.

Quote:

Originally Posted by binand (Post 3137346)

Attributing such behaviour to age is disingenuous.

My point: road accidents are caused by a subset of every demographic that comprises road users. It is a bit hypocritical to blame 18 year olds and tell them to stay off the road.

+1 to that. All my cousins, in the age group as same as mine do drive better that all the elders in the family. None of us speed, drive rash no matter we have our parents sitting at the back seat or friends. I believe this has to come from within and has to bee inculcated by the education given to us.
Saying that, my cousin who has just learnt driving isn't going to be given the wheel on the NHs till he has not been a good observer for atleast a couple of trips.

Quote:

Originally Posted by carzone (Post 3137390)

While I can relate to this because I myself has spent a considerable time in the front passenger seat when I was 15-16 years old, there are certain things like steering feedback, torque, handling, ABC pedal control, tyre grip, loading, centre of gravity which cannot be understood unless you actually spend time behind the wheel, that too on different vehicles. What you learn from experience, no amount of textbook learning can teach you.

Of course there are people who drive like morons even after 30 years of experience behind the wheel. Those are the people who are not willing to learn from their experience. Please don't bring taxi/ auto wallahs into this because they are a different breed altogether.

Quote:

Originally Posted by longhorn (Post 3137405)

agree:
Agreed totally. Some things are there that can be learnt only from experience and for that, you need to be on the wheel.
But, not letting them drive at all would also not help them learn. Point is, keeping the age group off the wheel is not going to serve the purpose.
That brings us to the same old topic that we should have good training schools here.
Let's not go on there as that has been discussed long and good on other threads. :)
All in all, parents should know when their children are fit mentally(to take the responsibility) and have enough experience to bear the responsibility of the power in their hands.

Quote:

Originally Posted by binand (Post 3137346)

The world's insurance companies know better.

India has not yet caught up with the idea of rating insurance according to the age, experience and record of the driver. When it does, it will become yet another country in which it will be almost impossible for youngsters to get on the road unless they are well off. Whilst I sympathise with the youth, this is not just an invention of the insurance companies, it is a reflection of the facts that they see in their claims. Young and/or inexperienced drivers cost them a lot of money.