Flashed. Was it flashing me??

[tvradict]

Driving back to the depot tonight, loaded up a gradient in a 30 passed a Speed Camera.

The white distance lines are quite new and even in the dark are easily visible.

Anyway, I had passed the camera, I was driving across the white lines at about 28/29mph (Needle showing 30 but I know my speedo over-reads) and my rear wheels were just clearing the white lines when the camera flashed twice. I remember a car going the other way at speed, but what are the chances of the Strathclyde Tax Camera Tax Collection Partnership trying to do me??

I had a look at my tacho when I got back into the depot and it clearly shows I didn't get above 30 between 18.07 and 18.13, the camera flashed at 18.09.

[slinky]

If the camera didn't trigger until your rear wheels were at the end of the white lines, I think you can be quite safe in the knowledge that you didn't get popped...

As I understand it, the camera is triggered as you enter the "zone" and the first shot should coincide with you hitting the first line, the second shot will be a set time later, the distance between the two shots gives your speed... as in distance/time=speed...

Hope that makes sense,

slinky
more than happy to be corrected if that is wrong!

edit to get my formula right!

>> Edited by slinky on Wednesday 17th November 00:15

[BlackStuff]

The way a GATSO works is as follows:

Vehicle passes camera, radar set measures speed.
If speed is in excess of preset threshold, camera is set off, which takes two pictures, half a second apart. By using the grid to compare the position of the vehicle in each of the two resulting pictures it can be seen how far it travelled during the time interval, and thus how fast it was going.

So the radar gun provides one piece of evidence, and the pictures corroborate it.

But in this case, whilst the radar gun may well have recorded an excessive speed from an oncoming vehicle, it will be apparent from the pictures that your vehicle was not speeding.

This should be picked up by the ticket office so no ticket should ever be issued. But it's not unheard of for them to send tickets out "on spec" in cases like these, as many people will simply pay the fine anyway.

So if you do get a ticket, ring them up and ask for the pictures. It will be immediately obvious that no offence was committed by you and the case will be dropped, but don't hold your breath waiting for an apology!

[NugentS]

Surely the thing to do here is to fill in the NIP but refuse to take the fixed penalty. Then enjoy your day out in court.

Always try and get the photos first though.

Sean

[deltaf]

Youre safe mate.
I often speed up when travelling towards gatso's just to make em flash....although in this case it wasnt me wot dun it...