SAD, SAD, News today

[bigdaddy51200]

I was stuck in traffic for 5 hours Saturday trying to get to CW of Nashville for
some service on my MH.

When I got back home last night learned what had happened, and why Interstate 65 was shut down. A Nashville police officer was killed by a motor home. I think there is a allot of lessons that can be learned from this story.

RIP Officer Petrina, my thoughts a prayers go out to your family .

Here is a link to the story :
Click

[Rollnhome]

I doubt the criminal aspect won't touch the civil liability.

[RetSgt7114]

msmith1199 wrote:


I doubt he's going to jail. It was an accident caused by inattention. If he was operating the vehicle with gross negligence or while drunk or something along those lines then yes, he may be headed to jail, but generally speaking people don't go to jail for accidents caused by traffic infractions. At least not that I've ever seen.

X2

[FuelFunnel]

The last time I checked, a 3-pack of safety flares cost $6.29 at AutoZone. Who doesn't wake up and slow down when you see these burning in the right 2 lanes of a blind curve? And the nice thing about flares is that if they are still burning, then you know the incident ahead is fairly recent and probably still a hazard.

Kris

[msmith1199]

Groover wrote:

msmith1199 wrote:

Groover wrote:
I just read the update and the comments attached to it. A lot of people are slamming the driver of the RV. While all drivers are responsible for controlling their vehicle the situation in Nashville probably contributed. Nashville has grown rapidly in the last few years and overwhelmed its road system. This leads to competitive driving and makes it impossible to keep a safe opening gap in front of you. It also demands a lot of attention in all directions. Having just come through Nashville during the afternoon rush I can tell you first hand that it is stressfull and quite a few drivers were driving agressively and way over the speed limit. This combined with four or five lanes going each direction and exits on both the left and right sides of the road give the driver a lot to keep track of and leads to taking eyes off the road in front. After this trip and before hearing of the accident I was discussing with my brother that Nashville needs a bypass that is much cleaner and safer to negotiate.

As a Tennessee resident I have noticed that since the law was passed requiring drivers to move over if possible a lot of law officers just assume that it will be possible and it will happen. They then walk around in the road with disregard for traffic and create some bad situations.

I grieve for all the people affected by this tragedy but just want to point out that a lot of factors contributed. I hope that they don't focus on just the RV driver's failures and make him into a scapegoat.

A scapegoat? I think what you'll find when the investigation is over that the primary cause of the accident will be listed as his fault because of inattention to the road conditions. There may be contributing factors listed, but he will be the primary cause of the accident. His insurance company is already getting ready to pay out the limits of the policy as we speak.

You are correct that paying out the limits of his insurance is probably a given. I am just saying that before they put him in jail for the rest of his life or seize everything he owns in retribution the contributing factors should be duly considered by people with more information and a level head.

I doubt he's going to jail. It was an accident caused by inattention. If he was operating the vehicle with gross negligence or while drunk or something along those lines then yes, he may be headed to jail, but generally speaking people don't go to jail for accidents caused by traffic infractions. At least not that I've ever seen.

[J-Rooster]

rgatijnet1 wrote:

TenOC wrote:
Update!!!

RV driver says one change could have prevented officer's death

New Info

I don't believe his statement. If he didn't have room to pull over with one lane blocked, he certainly would not have had room to pull over if the sign said two lanes were blocked.
In any case, he appears to say that he did not slow down as much as he would have if the sign said two lanes were blocked.
He wrongly assumed that if ONLY one lane was blocked, he could make it through rather than reacting to the warning sign and coming to a stop, or slowing way down as soon as soon as he saw it, which was before the curve.
I'm sure that he has talked to a lawyer and is being coached on what to say.

X-2, The motorhome driver should keep his mouth shut!

[Groover]

msmith1199 wrote:

Groover wrote:
I just read the update and the comments attached to it. A lot of people are slamming the driver of the RV. While all drivers are responsible for controlling their vehicle the situation in Nashville probably contributed. Nashville has grown rapidly in the last few years and overwhelmed its road system. This leads to competitive driving and makes it impossible to keep a safe opening gap in front of you. It also demands a lot of attention in all directions. Having just come through Nashville during the afternoon rush I can tell you first hand that it is stressfull and quite a few drivers were driving agressively and way over the speed limit. This combined with four or five lanes going each direction and exits on both the left and right sides of the road give the driver a lot to keep track of and leads to taking eyes off the road in front. After this trip and before hearing of the accident I was discussing with my brother that Nashville needs a bypass that is much cleaner and safer to negotiate.

As a Tennessee resident I have noticed that since the law was passed requiring drivers to move over if possible a lot of law officers just assume that it will be possible and it will happen. They then walk around in the road with disregard for traffic and create some bad situations.

I grieve for all the people affected by this tragedy but just want to point out that a lot of factors contributed. I hope that they don't focus on just the RV driver's failures and make him into a scapegoat.

A scapegoat? I think what you'll find when the investigation is over that the primary cause of the accident will be listed as his fault because of inattention to the road conditions. There may be contributing factors listed, but he will be the primary cause of the accident. His insurance company is already getting ready to pay out the limits of the policy as we speak.

You are correct that paying out the limits of his insurance is probably a given. I am just saying that before they put him in jail for the rest of his life or seize everything he owns in retribution the contributing factors should be duly considered by people with more information and a level head.

[Mr_Mark1]

One thing that I can pretty much guarantee is that if the RV guy talked to a lawyer, he would have said "say nothing". That way, there is nothing that could come back on you and get twisted. It was certainly an extremely unfortunate situation and I hope his insurance is paid up.

MM.

[OhhWell]

The more I look at it, it looks like there may have been only one lane blocked initially and when the info was posted on the sign. The officer is the only one blocking the second lane, not the trucks with the safety lights. It's possible that the officer needed to block that second lane so an emergency vehicle could get in place or something.

To me, the biggest thing I see is that those signs are just a warning and should never be taken as an exact description of the situation. They should probably modify the policy to not give any info on which and how many lanes are blocked. I know it seems like useful information for motorists trying to get through but... look what happened. Police are always modifying the amount of traffic that they need to divert. Shoot, they could have had 3 lanes blocked if they thought they needed to.

Also, I just can't help but think that he was going way too fast for that environment. If there was nowhere to go to his left, that tells me there was a lot of traffic and you KNOW those lanes on his left weren't going very fast. I also know that a big heavy coach like that is not going to stop as quickly as mine but still....

I know I'm not an expert but my gut feeling is that he saw all the slow, backed up traffic in the left 2 lanes and since the sign said only one lane blocked, he figured he would just cruise along in the lane he was in. Once again, happy in the information he wanted to hear, he probably didn't slow down anywhere near as much as he should have. Also, he probably wasn't the only one. Unfortunately, he was the one in the huge vehicle that doesn't slow or maneuver well.

I think that he did screw up. I think there were things he could have done and they were all before he pooped his pants and tried to thread the needle between that cop car and the road safety truck. He has to protect himself and his wife so he needs to say what he needs to say....

[msmith1199]

traveylin wrote:
The link to street view is interesting. If you look at the left side barrier at the accident location, it looks remarkably beat up by vehicles bouncing into it. Thats the direction the RV would have to go to move over the multiple lanes.

Pops

Oh yeah, any time you get a curve in a freeway like that it becomes a point for accidents. Modern freeway design is a huge science. If they could tear out all the freeways and install completely new ones right now, you would see a whole lot of things done differently that would prevent a lot of accidents. But they can't do that so we have to live with freeways designed back in the 50's and 60's and maybe even before that because a lot of our freeways were put on existing roads which could have been originally used by covered wagons.

If you look at this curve you do have a couple of issues. One you have the curve, but then you also have that elevated onramp to the right and it does limit the vision of the far end of the curve. So I'm sure that will be listed as a contributing factor to the collision, but most of the blame will still fall to the RV driver.

Also this is one of those accidents that we talk about on here when people discuss how overweight they are or how long they are. I can assure you as part of this investigation the State Troopers measured that RV, weighed that RV, and completely inspected the brakes on the RV and the brake system on that trailer, and checked everything else for mechanical operation too.

[msmith1199]

Groover wrote:
I just read the update and the comments attached to it. A lot of people are slamming the driver of the RV. While all drivers are responsible for controlling their vehicle the situation in Nashville probably contributed. Nashville has grown rapidly in the last few years and overwhelmed its road system. This leads to competitive driving and makes it impossible to keep a safe opening gap in front of you. It also demands a lot of attention in all directions. Having just come through Nashville during the afternoon rush I can tell you first hand that it is stressfull and quite a few drivers were driving agressively and way over the speed limit. This combined with four or five lanes going each direction and exits on both the left and right sides of the road give the driver a lot to keep track of and leads to taking eyes off the road in front. After this trip and before hearing of the accident I was discussing with my brother that Nashville needs a bypass that is much cleaner and safer to negotiate.

As a Tennessee resident I have noticed that since the law was passed requiring drivers to move over if possible a lot of law officers just assume that it will be possible and it will happen. They then walk around in the road with disregard for traffic and create some bad situations.

I grieve for all the people affected by this tragedy but just want to point out that a lot of factors contributed. I hope that they don't focus on just the RV driver's failures and make him into a scapegoat.

A scapegoat? I think what you'll find when the investigation is over that the primary cause of the accident will be listed as his fault because of inattention to the road conditions. There may be contributing factors listed, but he will be the primary cause of the accident. His insurance company is already getting ready to pay out the limits of the policy as we speak.

[traveylin]

The link to street view is interesting. If you look at the left side barrier at the accident location, it looks remarkably beat up by vehicles bouncing into it. Thats the direction the RV would have to go to move over the multiple lanes.

Pops

[Groover]

I just read the update and the comments attached to it. A lot of people are slamming the driver of the RV. While all drivers are responsible for controlling their vehicle the situation in Nashville probably contributed. Nashville has grown rapidly in the last few years and overwhelmed its road system. This leads to competitive driving and makes it impossible to keep a safe opening gap in front of you. It also demands a lot of attention in all directions. Having just come through Nashville during the afternoon rush I can tell you first hand that it is stressfull and quite a few drivers were driving agressively and way over the speed limit. This combined with four or five lanes going each direction and exits on both the left and right sides of the road give the driver a lot to keep track of and leads to taking eyes off the road in front. After this trip and before hearing of the accident I was discussing with my brother that Nashville needs a bypass that is much cleaner and safer to negotiate.

As a Tennessee resident I have noticed that since the law was passed requiring drivers to move over if possible a lot of law officers just assume that it will be possible and it will happen. They then walk around in the road with disregard for traffic and create some bad situations.

I grieve for all the people affected by this tragedy but just want to point out that a lot of factors contributed. I hope that they don't focus on just the RV driver's failures and make him into a scapegoat.

[rgatijnet1]

TenOC wrote:
Update!!!

RV driver says one change could have prevented officer's death

New Info

I don't believe his statement. If he didn't have room to pull over with one lane blocked, he certainly would not have had room to pull over if the sign said two lanes were blocked.
In any case, he appears to say that he did not slow down as much as he would have if the sign said two lanes were blocked.
He wrongly assumed that if ONLY one lane was blocked, he could make it through rather than reacting to the warning sign and coming to a stop, or slowing way down as soon as soon as he saw it, which was before the curve.
I'm sure that he has talked to a lawyer and is being coached on what to say.

[Daveinet]

I think we are a lot more blind than we think we are. Grant it, the seating position in a motorhome is high up in the air, but it still doesn't take much to block one's view. Driving home from work today, I made an observation. I was in a car, following an SUV. At 45 mph, I counted the 2 second rule. In reality, it was about 2.5 seconds. From the driver's position, I could only see about 400 feet ahead of me for anything on the side of the road. I could not see the vehicle in front of the SUV, but I knew he was there because of the shadow. It really doesn't take much to hide what is in your lane, or what is next to you. A moderate size truck will block your view and that is all it takes.