Road crashes pile up in rainy weather
(CNS): Between just after 5am and just before 11am today (Tuesday 11 November) officers from the RCIPS attended six motor collisions (one pictured left) in George Town during the wet weather. Although no serious injuries were received by anyone, police urged drivers to take greater care on the road, especially in inclement weather. Motorist are advised to increase the distance between them and the car in front to at least two car lengths in the rain to cut down on the number of crashes. Police also said that they arrested nine people over the long weekend for drinking and driving. Another 21 arrests were made for a host of other offences between Friday night and Tuesday morning.
Category: Local News
The real problem on the roads of Cayman is that I am the only one who knows how to drive.
We seem to have more road accidents here, especially one car accidents where the driver runs off the road, often into a light pole. Gd forbid if these drivers had to contend with winter driving on snow and ice!.
Yes, I was very surprised when the police said the following distance should be at least two seconds when its raining. 2 seconds is the following distance in ideal conditions, in rainy conditions that disctance should at least double. That's what I learnt on my drivers course – not taken on this island!
Tailing (and drving through a trafficcircle etiquette) are serious problems on this island but it can easily be eradicated. It requires action from our RCIPS. They should be policing trafficcircles. If they see an illegal or dangerous move, they should stop the driver and give him/her a warning. This warning should be logged on the driver's record. If the same driever gets stopped again for the same offence, they should be fined. Same should happen for tailgating. It's not rocket science nor very taxing!
The driving test is soooo easy in Cayman and infortunately the driving instruction is mediocre at best. They are proud of the 80 percent pass rate in the driving test, but experiemce on the roads is testament as to why they should not be.
I learned in driver's education, one car length for every 10 miles per hour. That means 3 car lengths at 30 MPH, on DRY pavement. The tailgating on this island is crazy, I am NOT going to speed up is you are on my bumber, so back off. Another tip, if your windshield wipers are on, your head lights should also be on.
It is actually 2 seconds behind OR 1 car length for every 10 miles per hour of speed.
Average reaction time for a driver is 0.75 seconds. A car doing only 30 mph covers 44 ft in 1 second. Recommending car lengths is meaningless without knowing the speed and conditions. 2 seconds minimum following distance is recommended. What driving school did the RCIPS guys qualify at? Oh, wait….
My last ex-wife used to tail-gate a lot too…
But then she also did a lot of other things that I did not approve of…
I may have tailgated her once or twice now that I think about it.
Apparently a lot of guys did…
People still think they can drive the same in the wet as they can in the dry…on slippery roads and bad tyres..and a lot drive really badlyin the dry…never ceases to amaze
At least 2 car lengths ? THAT is soooo wrong.
4 seconds is the correct and save distance, but what can you expect when most people have either a jamaican driver license or are local and learned to drive on x-box or playstation.
Minimum age for boys to drive should be 25 and a 500$ fine for tailing.
3 tickets and goodbye license.
The article says two car lengths – is that a joke??? These are stopping distances published by the UK government (includes thinking and braking) for dry weather with a well maintained car –
20mph – 40feet (3 car lengths)
30mph – 75feet (6 car lengths)
40mph – 118feet (9 car lengths)
50mph – 175feet (13 car lengths)
You just need to make getting a license more difficult than not crashing on your test. You won't change everyone that's already on the road, but hopefully the new drivers will eventually outweigh the bad, if you keep putting marginal drivers on the road and they have no critical mass of decent drivers to learn from how do you expect them to get any better?
what does being a boy have to do with anything? girls on average tend to drive at faster speeds. boys will, admittedly, give their tacometer a good stretch every now and then. but from my perspective it tends to be women getting in these kinds of accidents and the only reason why theres such a stigma against boys is because their accidents tend to end more in fatalities but when you compare the two which one happens more often?
Hopefully no serious injuries. Safety first! Drive safely even if it means getting to work just in the nick of time
Tailgating is a serious problem here. Is it cool to be 2 feet off the car in front? whats the point? i get really mad about it and i dont have kids in my car. if i was a parent with children i would be really losing my shirt.
Two feet? There was a yellows bus (not sure if school bus) in town during that heavy rain practically touching my back bumper – no space at all – absolutely crazy driving!!!
And when they do it to a two-wheeler, it is the same as assault with a deadly weapon!
Just tap your brakes gently then hit the accelerator to the floor. They get the message pretty quickly.
I just slow down to a crawl and waive at them. There used to be a guy with a bad moustache and a nasty green old japanese car (I know that describes 25% of road users) that used to tailgate me regularly on West Bay Road. He would get so angry when I slowed down, especially when I let people in.
Try putting 'L' plates on your car and see how badly you get treated, taking my kid out with them on at the weekend and I was ready to get out and punch someone, thankfully my kid wasn't fazed by it, probably because they don't yet understand the risks. And before any smart arse goes on about being too slow, we kept to all the speed limits and kept up with traffic, no dawdling here. The other time you get treated worse is if you have a small rental car, drive the same every day route and you would be amazed at the number of people who try to bully you off the road. I don't get it. Maybe it's an inferiority complex?
A following distance of 2 car lengths is fine if you are going 10 miles per hour. At higher speeds and in poor driving conditions the distance needs to be increased. It is far better to stay at least 2 seconds behind the vehicle in front of you at all speeds in ideal driving conditions and increase the distance accordingly when driving conditions are not ideal. I learned this in driver education class over 25 years ago. If the police are going to give out driving advice they might as well give out somewhat current advice. The same goes for the ads on the radio sponsored by insurance companies.