2 fault collisions in 3 years - advanced driving course?

[Shiv_P]

Hi all

I have been st enough today to have my second fault collision in 3 years. Both were on NSL country lanes and basically due to a lack of observation, first I pulled out on a van and today I hit a narrow bridge wall and rolled into a ditch.

It's stupid and clearly need some further tuition to action this problem. Can anyone recommend any advanced driving course etc that will help enhance my awareness on these types of roads?

Thanks

[Shiv_P]

Tommie38 said:

Sorry to hear that Shiv

I hope you don’t mind me saying, but the things that you are describing don’t sound like advanced driving but more foundational driving.

Perhaps do some lessons with a learner instructor as a refresher?

The following may not be relevant at all to you, and feel free to ignore it… but if you are making foundational mistakes could something else be the matter? Sleep, concentration, just come off smoking, anything on your mind? No need to answer, just to put some ideas to you.

When I look back on the accidents that I have had over the course of the last 20+ years, they have always been concentration as a result of lack of sleep. I had two in the space of 3 months. None for the next 10 years so luck was probably part of it.

Hi

What you have said makes sense and yes I guess foundational mistakes rather than something that would be solved with advanced driving tuition. The other factor in both accidents were driving/looking into direct sunlight, so I'll get an eye test booked as well as some booster lessons

Thanks

[Shiv_P]

Bloody hell, didn't realise I'd get so much praise for crashing

I'll look into iam or rospa thanks.
I was wearing sunglasses, but I don't know these things happen in a bit of a flash really

Thanks all any further advise is appreciated

[Shiv_P]

Haltamer said:

Were they polarised? - Very helpful with glare in my experience; I practically wouldn't bother going out on a bright day without them at this point.

As for happening in a bit of a flash - It may be worth having a long consider of all the contributory factors that led up to the event, considering both long term and immediate effects as another poster mentioned above:-
Were you very familiar with the route? (Complacent)
Any emotional / human factors; Out with the intent of driving at 10/10ths?
Was the car 100% - Suspension, tyres all checked and ready?


As the accident investigation documentaries often say, an accident is a chain of critical events leading to a failure - I'd imagine you could think of several contributing factors that added up to the (disasterous) outcome.

They were polarised, yes. Brand new road to me on my commute as there was traffic on my usual route, so there is the exact root cause of the problem. Just commute so no intention of driving fast

[Shiv_P]

akirk said:

A van can be surprisingly easy to miss as it is moving - a bridge wall is more challenging to miss - to hit that and roll into a ditch is quite a serious accident… I am going to make an assumption that you were driving too fast - not necessarily above the speed limit but too fast for the conditions / your ability to see into the sun / your general ability / etc. So step 1 is slow down - it also gives you more time for observation…

Secondly (which may or may not have helped today) you want to look further ahead in order to maximise observation - a lot of drivers look only close to their car and there only have time to react, whereas you want time to plan… The simplest way to do this is to raise your eyes - look through the upper half of the windscreen for instant improved observation…

You can also start to consciously talk yourself through the scene - I know it sounds mad but pretend that you are talking in a load of fighter jets to take out the countryside - you need to tell them where to aim - tractor at 11 on a side road coming towards me, check for hostiles over the bridge and in that farmyard start to read the whole landscape…

And going slower will help you learn to do that

Sorry, I should clarify the car didn't actually roll over. I hit/scraped the bridge (the bridge is one car wide, the road is 2 cars wide), and that pushed me off to the right side where the car drove into the ditch. I was probably doing 25-30mph (which is probably still too quick for that part of the road) at point of impact, but the car is repairable and being repaired through insurance
However totally agree, I wasn't driving to the road conditions at that point but primarily because I didn't see/bother to see what was coming up further down the road