8 people killed in Utah sand storm
It appears that at least one RV was destroyed in this tragic incident. More than 20 vehicles were involved and a contributing factor was a sand storm. We pray for all those involved.
Forum Discussion
Thermoguy wrote:
So, your driving along at say 50mph, then a sandstorm fueled by strong winds takes away your visibility so you can't see past your bumper, what do you do? If you hit the brakes, you cause a chain reaction accident on the freeway, if you don't hit the brakes you sail right through it or hit the car in front of you that hit the brakes... Which do you think happened here? No one knows for sure, but on a straight road you would probably drive right out of it is you didn't touch the brakes and just held your car straight. These things happen because someone freaked out and tried to stop and the people behind them didn't.
I almost got in a car accident because someone hit the brakes driving on wet roads, there was an unseen puddle and they hit the brakes in moderately heavy traffic, everyone else just held their course. Hitting the brakes causes the car to swerve vs holding your lane and riding through it.
Decades and millions of miles of driving, and the only time things ever went from can see to drive 50, to can't see at all, was when I had a headlight issue. If you have your head where it belongs you can see that visibility is fading, or you can see a wall of dust, snow, rain, smoke that you can't see thru. If you drop your speed before you hit that wall, you will not hit anything hidden by that wall. There have been times when rain increased to the point I hope I'm on the shoulder.
IMHO, for anybody to say "I must go, even when I can't see because a idiot might not see me stopped" takes a special kind of stupid.
Now often trucks do hit, driving to fast for conditions. But normally the change in conditions is traction, not visibility
