So, about that Mercedes slippy-slidey video then...

The road is that slippery both cars are likely hard on the brakes with the ABS going mental and the cars not slowing down as expected. The VW looks to have thought it safer to go the other side of the island to avoid the Smart car with the Mercedes unable to slow down after coming over the hill with more speed I doubt they deliberately speed up more likely the VW found a little grip and managed to slow down more. Once you are on ice not much you can do apart from be glad you have insurance.
 
Hades said:
Actually could cars being automatically nowadays contribute to it? I still drive manuals and would.have been in a very low gear to get engine braking. But presumably an auto would be in a higher gear and just pick up speed on the icy incline?
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Only older autos - the newer ones tend to react very quickly, faster than a human can, to stuff like that. Though occasionally they will get it wrong (the Tiguan has all kinds of tech for just these kind of situations).

EDIT: Though that does depend somewhat in driving in an appropriate manner - driving like the VW was doing my auto will detect it and kick in engine braking (which normally I have to use sports for).
 
Rroff said:
Only older autos - the newer ones tend to react very quickly, faster than a human can, to stuff like that. Though occasionally they will get it wrong (the Tiguan has all kinds of tech for just these kind of situations).

EDIT: Though that does depend somewhat in driving in an appropriate manner - driving like the VW was doing my auto will detect it and kick in engine braking (which normally I have to use sports for).
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The time they get it wrong is the time that this kind of thing happens. A manual is much better for this as it's not going to do something dumb on it's own.
 
Nasher said:
The time they get it wrong is the time that this kind of thing happens. A manual is much better at times like this as you know exactly what it's going to do.
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Not sure which model the VW is but stuff like 4Motion active control, etc. on the Tiguan is pretty decent for handling conditions like this and don't really take away the ability to maintain control as long as you drive appropriately still - going back to the first post though I think some people get too used to the tech being able to handle it and drive beyond what is recoverable if the tech does get it wrong and have no idea how to correct for it.
 
Merc driver to blame here, look how far back they are to the VW at the start. They end up next to each other which means the merc driver accelerates (or doesn't brake) towards an icy downhill section of road
 
Rroff said:
There was a whole string of cars behind me - had been slowing moving traffic each way for the last 2-3 miles.

Wish I had a rear dashcam as well - the Rav4 was already coming around me at around 27 or 28 seconds or so - I'd been planning on letting the other driver through any way but if I hadn't and hadn't been watching my rear view I'd have crushed him into the railings! total idiot of a driver as well as impatient.
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Probably wasn't counting on you to exhibit undue hesitation :rolleyes:
 
Rroff said:
Not sure which model the VW is but stuff like 4Motion active control, etc. on the Tiguan is pretty decent for handling conditions like this and don't really take away the ability to maintain control as long as you drive appropriately still - going back to the first post though I think some people get too used to the tech being able to handle it and drive beyond what is recoverable if the tech does get it wrong and have no idea how to correct for it.
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Sometimes the tech stops you from being able to recover it. E.g. Traction control will only try and straighten the car up, but it doesn't care which direction you are pointing. It will fight you trying to counter a slide and bin the car for you.

It isn't designed for rally driving :p
 
Yet another completely predictable accident that could be avoided if the Merc driver had read the signs. Merc was driving to fast for the conditions. The Smart car was clearly badly positioned either through being stuck or badly parked. In the second clip you can clearly see SUV struggle to keep control while squeezing between the Smart and the centre island. Still not an excuse to ram into it at speed.
The VW made the correct decision to pass the wrong side of the island at a speed at which he was clearly keeping his car under control.
Big heavy Merc probably on wide summer rubber comes barreling to the scene to fast and can't stop or steer to take avoiding action. Can't see anyone else at fault but the Merc.
The Merc driver should have seen the steep downhill, the icy road, the slow car ahead taking evasive action to the wrong side of the road, the badly parked Smart, the large amount of rubbernecking residents. How many more clues do you need to slow right down?
 
Nasher said:
Sometimes the tech stops you from being able to recover it. E.g. Traction control will only try and straighten the car up, but it doesn't care which direction you are pointing :p
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True but that comes with using the appropriate approach in the first place which generally means that you have options (as much as you ever do when encountering ice). Even a manual you are basically at the mercy of the conditions once you start going on ice :| something I've been well aware of driving at ~2am the last few nights - fortunately I did OK but the drivers not long behind me were leaving the road in droves causing the police to close the road: https://www.somersetlive.co.uk/news/somerset-news/a30-a303-closures-number-vehicles-4915927 I went past the next day and there was a ridiculous number of tyre tracks over the verge and ending at the hedge row around one corner - at least 6 people must have come off around the same point.
 
dLockers said:
Probably wasn't counting on you to exhibit undue hesitation :rolleyes:
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What undue hesitation? bare in mind I'm driving a bigger vehicle and the Rav4 was already starting to come around me while I was rolling making sure it was clear to proceed as sometimes you get people pushing through the bit with parked cars there against traffic which would have left me in a bad spot.

TBH not sure your point unless you were one of those drivers.

EDIT: At ~30 seconds I was just easing off as the Rav4 was already pulling out around me.

EDIT2: Regardless you don't just push past around a vehicle like that as there could be a number of reasons for perceived "hesitation" that you might not be able to see it is just plain idiotic driving and leads to all number of incidents which could have been avoided.
 
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The way I see it, the road is downhill and very icy (another car crashed right before this). There is a very good chance that the Merc driver had no control over the speed or direction of the vehicle. Maybe they were too high a speed when cresting the hill. Either way, poor judgement trying to drive the car down that road in those conditions.
 
I don’t think the VW driver did anything wrong. Driving the wrong side of the road there looked liked a sensible thing to do given the circumstances, looks like the safer route.

Merc, unsure what’s going on there. Was he driving too fast intentionally or lost control of it early? Hard to tell.
 
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merc was 100% too fast for the conditions. The VW obviously moved over to avoid the stranded smart car and the merc thought he'd be clever.
 
Rroff said:
What undue hesitation? bare in mind I'm driving a bigger vehicle and the Rav4 was already starting to come around me while I was rolling making sure it was clear to proceed as sometimes you get people pushing through the bit with parked cars there against traffic which would have left me in a bad spot.

TBH not sure your point unless you were one of those drivers.

EDIT: At ~30 seconds I was just easing off as the Rav4 was already pulling out around me.

EDIT2: Regardless you don't just push past around a vehicle like that as there could be a number of reasons for perceived "hesitation" that you might not be able to see it is just plain idiotic driving and leads to all number of incidents which could have been avoided.
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If you are going to pull a video out of yourself to prove a point, probably needs to be a lot less open to interpretation than that :p It really looks like you were hesitating and could have just kept up with the 4x4 with the trailer...
 
dLockers said:
If you are going to pull a video out of yourself to prove a point, probably needs to be a lot less open to interpretation than that :p It really looks like you were hesitating and could have just kept up with the 4x4 with the trailer...
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I don't see how that aspect is open to interpretation regardless of whether I hesitated or not people shouldn't just pull around me like that.

I did ease up a bit to see what the situation was as given the amount of traffic behind me the decent thing to do would have been to let the other car through - which had right of way anyway - normally if I'm coming up behind a string of traffic already passing through with a car waiting I'll join on but with a fluid situation like that one a bit of pragmatism ultimately eases traffic flow in both directions.

EDIT: That village tends to be a pain at the best of times - here is going the other way just behind me at another time https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViHmIjN7u7s

(Couple of weeks later the X5 had a lorry go into the back of it then in the same day someone else scraped it all along the side - they still persisted with parking there until their mini got hit some time later at which point they finally started using the pull in they'd made months before)
 
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Don't think we know how much grip the merc had could have had all season tyres,
car tracks indicated other drivers had gone around the smart, so merc driver is somewhat vindicated staying on correct side of road.

did the vw indicate right, so the merc legitimatey thought he was parking/turning-off too

Incompetent driver was still in control and in the smart, what were they playing at ? stopping in a dangerous position no hazards.
 
Rroff said:
I don't see how that aspect is open to interpretation regardless of whether I hesitated or not people shouldn't just pull around me like that.

I did ease up a bit to see what the situation was as given the amount of traffic behind me the decent thing to do would have been to let the other car through - which had right of way anyway - normally if I'm coming up behind a string of traffic already passing through with a car waiting I'll join on but with a fluid situation like that one a bit of pragmatism ultimately eases traffic flow in both directions.

EDIT: That village tends to be a pain at the best of times - here is going the other way just behind me at another time https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViHmIjN7u7s

(Couple of weeks later the X5 had a lorry go into the back of it then in the same day someone else scraped it all along the side - they still persisted with parking there until their mini got hit some time later at which point they finally started using the pull in they'd made months before)
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You drive like a granddad :o
 
jpaul said:
Incompetent driver was still in control and in the smart, what were they playing at ? stopping in a dangerous position no hazards.
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Complete guess but I suspect the driver had no experience of driving the conditions, had a bit of a close call on that bit just before and **** themselves and lacked the confidence to move the vehicle - though plenty of space to pull off the road better.
 
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