Who was at fault?

[DanTheMan]

The thing that confuses me is that if the first car had crashed into the merc and the 500 had stopped in time, the merc would have been at fault for pulling out.

 

[Orion21]

The whole point is that you should be driving at all times with the view that YOU may need to make an emergency stop. Whatever the reason.

One of the big problems with driving too close is it severly restricts your visibility around the vehicle in front, drop back a bit and its surprising how much more you can see in front of that vehicle, especially if its a van or lorry or similar.

You can't just make an emergency stop without having a reason, otherwise you're driving carelessly yourself. That said I'm not disputing that the fiat 500 driver was too close and should have been further back and able to react, just that it required 2 things to cause the accident, the merc overshooting a giveway line (significantly if the picture is anything to go by), and the fiat 500driving too close and being unable to react in time.

The only totally innocent party is the primera, both the fiat and merc have some blame and in my opinion could in theory both be done for careless driving.

 

[unrealrocks]

One of the big problems with driving too close is it severly restricts your visibility around the vehicle in front, drop back a bit and its surprising how much more you can see in front of that vehicle, especially if its a van or lorry or similar.

So true - see so many people around town right up the arses of a bus yet the second they stop they realise they are about 3 feet from the back of the bus with zero visibility and have to really swing out to get round rather than being a decent distance, see the indicator and cruise round barley having to change direction

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

You can't just make an emergency stop without having a reason

I never said anything about anyone making an emergency stop, I said you should be driving at all times as if you should need to, thats different.

There are millions of reasons you may need to make an emergency stop, driving along in traffic does not make you immune from them.

 

[Matt82]

I was just nearly rear ended. The car behind was driving quicker than normal traffic and catching me quite quickly. I rounded a left hand bend and traffic ahead was stationary and he was distracted and had to do an emergency stop

A small lapse in attention is reason enough to require an emergency stop