No Emergency Training

[telecat]

I was thinking about "Street/Speed/no"'s accidents and generally the mayhem that seems to prevade out roads when anything except perfect grip is avavailable. When you take the PPL you HAVE to prove you can cope with a stall and a unpowered landing. Emergency situations that can occur in a small aircraft. By Contrast in a car what to do when a car slides, has brake failure etc is down to the driver to find out these days. The current emphasis on "where is your dipstick/washer bottle" should be shifted to a more useful subject.

[No Discretion]

From now until March will be a nightmare....as nobody seems to adapt to the changing climate and season..

We dealing with so many accidents and follow up enquiries that we have very little 'down time' in which to pro-actively deal with driver behaviour, uninsured cars and more importantly drink drivers...

[Mr E]

telecat said:

I was thinking about "Street/Speed/no"'s accidents and generally the mayhem that seems to prevade out roads when anything except perfect grip is avavailable. When you take the PPL you HAVE to prove you can cope with a stall and a unpowered landing. Emergency situations that can occur in a small aircraft. By Contrast in a car what to do when a car slides, has brake failure etc is down to the driver to find out these days. The current emphasis on "where is your dipstick/washer bottle" should be shifted to a more useful subject.

This is actually an excellent point.

I assume that a Class 1 and HGV test involve something in this area?

[BliarOut]

I love tail steering and try to provoke a gentle slide exiting every roundabout at this time of year.... Perhaps this is why I don't automatically head for the nearest tree every time the car gets a bit loose.

I'm all for skid pan training before being let loose on the roads.

[cuneus]

I wobner what the "typical" reaction to an unexpected slide is ?

[BliarOut]

cuneus said:

I wobner what the "typical" reaction to an unexpected slide is ?

and sit there waiting for the crash I suspect.

Even when a crash is inevitable, there's still often time to decide on which crash you are going to have.

Don't panic

[/MrMainwaring]

[havoc]

"Bloody hell what idiot is overtaking me on a roundabout/bend."
"Oh, they've got the same car as me."
"Oh , it's MY car!!"
"Oh , I'm facing all the oncoming traffic."

At least, judging by a couple of spins I've seen (and the first one I ever had!!! ), that is likely to be the chain of thinking.

[stackmonkey]

havoc said:

"Bloody hell what idiot is overtaking me on a roundabout/bend." "Oh, they've got the same car as me." "Oh , it's MY car!!" "Oh , I'm facing all the oncoming traffic." At least, judging by a couple of spins I've seen (and the first one I ever had!!! ), that is likely to be the chain of thinking.

Oh having my 1st spin (several years ago) outside a tyre factory was salutary..

[cptsideways]

cuneus said:

I wobner what the "typical" reaction to an unexpected slide is ?

Opposite lock held until the car rotates all the way back round & on into the hedge.

Very few drivers have a natural & correct action to unreal the opp lock at the right time, which is probably more important than learning opp lock in the first place.

[GreigM]

Natural reaction is to slam on the brakes, close eyes and hope for the best.

Only problem with "learning" to deal with slides is how do you provide the facilities to learn and test. The police have specially equipped cars and/or skid pans, but your average driving instructor doesn't.

[BliarOut]

I learnt to drive on wet grass when I was about 13... Skid control is just as natural for me as driving

There's a lot to be said for learning the basics of car control with very limited grip. Too heavy with any of the controls, and the car doesn't do what you want it to. OK, it's not likely to become official government training practice, but I'll definitely teach my daughters to drive off road first.

[iaint]

BliarOut said:

I love tail steering and try to provoke a gentle slide exiting every roundabout at this time of year.... Perhaps this is why I don't automatically head for the nearest tree every time the car gets a bit loose. I'm all for skid pan training before being let loose on the roads.

My better half is Swedish () and she can't believe the lack of 'advanced' training here. Motorway and skid/winter driving being the two major ones. They're trained to a much higher standard than we are and arguable, due to the lack of traffic therem they are in less need than us.

This time of year is, obviously, bad for accidents - almost all of which are avoidable if more care is taken or people are equipped to deal with the situations they get into.

This is not just limted to normal numpties - the winter cull of high-perf motors is well underway. Frustratingly I've been having to drive everywhere on much less than half-throttle and it's frustrating but that's the way it is.

Had a fun moment on the A2 last night heading in to town - 50 limit, traffic lights, 3 lanes into 2 and I'm in the vanishing lane. Nice wiggle that could've turned into a real tank-slapper moment but didn't because a) I was lucky and b) I pretty much knew it would happen and know how to cope. I've done a bit of learning in safe environments though to get to a place where I feel safe allowing the car to get a bit loose. Pity more people don't take their driving seriously enough to learn to cope beyond the normal experience...

Iain

[Carnage]

I attended a rather amusing (non-injury) T/A a couple of years back. Mrs Miggins has just got herself one of those lovely MX-5 things, presumably jumping straight out of some front wheel drive box. Not only did she spin it coming off a roundabout onto a dual carriageway in heavy rain, clipping both sets of barriers before coming to a halt, she was then hit by the driver following behind her too close for the conditions. Just to make it absolutely perfect, it was her husband...

If someone can get that out of shape with what, 120 bhp at most, extra training is clearly required!

[Mr E]

I actually managed to get all 4 wheels sliding under power this lunchtime. Quite impressively slippery out there considering just how much grip the car generates.

Keep them shiny side up chaps.

[esselte]

iaint said:

My better half is Swedish () and she can't believe the lack of 'advanced' training here. Motorway and skid/winter driving being the two major ones. They're trained to a much higher standard than we are and arguable, due to the lack of traffic therem they are in less need than us. Iain

Sweden's fatality rate is not too much different to ours.There were 519 last year with a population of around 9 million.Why would that be if their training is of a higher standard.Not an argument,just a question.

[Peter Ward]

BliarOut said:

There's a lot to be said for learning the basics of car control with very limited grip. Too heavy with any of the controls, and the car doesn't do what you want it to. OK, it's not likely to become official government training practice, but I'll definitely teach my daughters to drive off road first.

Very good point. If you're used to the old %^$%&& we used to drive then you have a much better idea of what to do when you run out of grip. If you've only ever known a car with 215/50s you've probably never found the limits until that one emergency that took you unawares.

[BliarOut]

Peter Ward said:

BliarOut said: There's a lot to be said for learning the basics of car control with very limited grip. Too heavy with any of the controls, and the car doesn't do what you want it to. OK, it's not likely to become official government training practice, but I'll definitely teach my daughters to drive off road first. Very good point. If you're used to the old %^$%&& we used to drive then you have a much better idea of what to do when you run out of grip. If you've only ever known a car with 215/50s you've probably never found the limits until that one emergency that took you unawares.

I still remember my first couple of bike crashes on the wet grass.... I overtook my mate on my arse, minus the bike after panicking on the way into a corner. He looked surprised to see me sliding quite so fast

[rustybin]

esselte said:

Sweden's fatality rate is not too much different to ours.There were 519 last year with a population of around 9 million.Why would that be if their training is of a higher standard.Not an argument,just a question.

Perhaps, as their road conditions (grip-wise) are generally much worse than ours they could be considered to be doing well to keep the rate as low as ours?

[havoc]

Amen...you need something where you can learn what the limits feel like, on both sides, and how a car will react at or near them...and sadly almost all modern cars don't let you do that at safe speeds - I mean FFS some of the Mondeo's in the car park have 225/40R18 rubber!!! Manufacturer's fit!!! Even cooking fiesta's now come with 16" alloys and 195-tyres.

Why not make skid-pan training a compulsory part of the test? Or part of a follow-up test 1 year after passing the standard one (Maybe pass test, restricted to 50/75bhp for 1 year, then take "unrestricted test", including skid-pan, motorway, and an assessment of road manners) We live in one of the wettest countries in Western Europe, it MIGHT JUST save people...and will definitely prevent accidents.

On a similar note, I for one am reluctant to "trade-up" from my current steed to one with more power and grip...mainly because the limits are too high, which can only encourage quicker driving...which may well end in tears. I'm already driving something quick enough to kill myself in quite easily, FFS.

So I might just trade down when I get itchy to change...something Elise-sized with reasonable grip, reasonable limits, but a very nice N/A engine with maybe 200bhp.

[donteatpeople]

I like the Idea of the limited licence could be similar to the current bike licence.

I think most people frown apon leaning the limits of your car as its "dangerous" so this is going to hinder progress.

People saying about modern cars having lots of grip, have you seen what learners drive. I know at least most of the people who have just passed there test cant afford a modern car. Ive been driving about 3 years and my first car was a Nova and there is plenty of room to find the limits i know the older people on this site will have driven worse than a nova but i think its pleanty crap enough.