Cold-weather conditions and negligence.
P.O.V. - it’s 27 degrees outside, snow has encapsulated your vehicle and your fingers are freezing as you dust off your door handle. You dive inside the car, blast the heat and turn on your defroster. You wait, and wait, and wait some more.
“Ugh, I needed my Starbucks latte like an hour ago - why can’t this ice melt any faster!?” Frustrated and uncaffeinated you reverse your car out of your driveway despite that the ice has only just begun to melt on your windshield. “I can see well enough” you mutter to yourself, as you peer through the dinner-plate sized hole that appeared on your windshield and drive the familiar route out of your neighborhood and onto the highway. Only 10 short minutes from your beloved coffee goddess, Starbucks.
All of the sudden - THUD! WHAM! You recoil in shock as you try to uncover what hit your car - or what you hit with your car. You pull over to the side of the highway and see a shredded tire caught in your rear-wheel bay. You look even further behind you and see that several cars have also pulled over, and their drivers are all staring at you.
It appears that you ran right over a shredded tire which would have been visible had the ice on your windshield completely melted off, allowing you to see through the southwesterly region of your windshield. Seconds later, the vehicle behind you slammed into you due to your sudden emergency braking. And a vehicle behind it slammed into it’s rear.
Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve got a classic 3 car pile up on our hands with a murky factual situation at best.
But was this avoidable? Certainly! Let’s make sure you don’t experience anything like this while you’re out and about on a snowy / icy day like today.
1) Completely remove all ice and snow from your windshield before driving
We’ve all seen it - a driver coming towards us on the road has only partially cleaned their windshield before getting on the road. Whether it be because the driver was in a rush, or did not have the proper tools to easily clean their windshield, or maybe they were just cold and lazy. This is a fast track to an accident.
Driving, for most of us, is a routine and uneventful part of our day. Because most of the time spent on the road is so mundane, we tend to overestimate our abilities when conditions are not ideal, such as in a sleet or snowstorm. We shouldn’t. Take the extra 5 or 10 minutes to sit in your car with the defroster on before driving. It is the safer decision for you and everyone else on the road.
2) Increase follow distance of the car in front of you in case of black ice
Glaze ice, also known as “black ice,” is ice that may appear invisible unless you are able to inspect it from a few feet away. Whenever black ice might be present you should exercise a heightened amount of due diligence in driving. It's highly advisable that you increase the number of car limbs between your vehicle and the vehicle ahead of you by twice the amount you would normally employ when driving on the highway. Is this a hard and fast rule? No. It is what I learned in middle school driver’s education. However, have I ever been in a car accident following this rule? No I have not.
3) Ensure headlights are on and all safety lights are in good working condition
Your headlights don’t only exist to allow drivers to see in the dark. They are also helpful for signaling to other drivers that you are heading their direction, how fast you are traveling, and your proximity to them. It is best practice to have your headlights on during heavy rain and heavy snowstorms.
While the time to check your other lights are working is not the day of or after a large snow, it’s better late than never. Before you hit the roadways take a minute or two to check your brake lights, turn signals and hazards. Unless you’re a trucker riding the big rigs you likely don’t have a reliable way to verbally communicate with other drivers on the road. That is why car manufacturers gave us brake lights, headlights and turn signals: the voice of the automobile.
Headlights communicate distance and can be used to communicate the presence of police. Turn signals tell drivers in front of you and behind you which direction you intend to drive. Brake lights communicate to drivers behind you that you are decreasing speed or halting your car. This information must be communicated promptly and reliably, by everyone on the road, or else structured roadways become no better than a go-kart track.
Negligence
Each one of these tips has something in common, and no, it’s not my poetic and profound prose. Rather, it is that if you follow them you will lessen the chances that you are involved in a motor vehicle accident. If you are involved in an accident, at a minimum you will not be negligent for driving with impaired visibility, following too closely and hitting another car due to black ice, or failing to communicate with other drivers due to failed equipment.
Stay safe ~
Zechariah C. Etheridge, Etheridge Law PLLC
