Wonder Why Truckers Are Hated By The Public,Watch This Video

[montana_man]

Tramper:
COOL Freightliner Argosy, I did’nt get to see more than the first 30 secs of video as the ■■■■ thing kept stopping and strarting and buffering and got sdo up my nose that I turned it off. But thoses COE Argosy’s are made by Meredes and there’s no reason we couldn’t have them instead of the crappy Actros Megaspace.

You wouldn’t think that if you had driven one Tramper Trust me an Actros is quieter, more spacious and more comfortable. Not to mention a hell of a lot easier to climb into

Given the choice I’d choose your old Pete over that mate

[mrflibble]

I’d also say the crash was 50/50. The Merc was in the truck’s blind spot, and the Merc driver should have been more aware. I also agree that the woman being interviewed contributed to, if not caused, the accident by forcing the truck to try to undertake her because she refused to pull out of the offside lane despite having ample opportunity to do so.

Of course, the following truck was tailgating aggressively, and her actions don’t excuse that.

Did anyone else also notice that whilst their “driving vigilante” was pointing out people tailgating, he was following the car in front in his lane with less than half a second gap? Pots and Kettles come to mind here.

I also note that whilst the article itself seemed to be a bit more balanced, noting that there were both bad and good car and truck drivers, the title was “Terrorizing Trucks”.

[shade]

UPDATE…This ‘story’ was done by Channel nine in Australia, however, a rival channel , channel 7 has cast doubt over the validity of the piece after talking to witnesses. The police have now launched an investigation into the alledged accident.

[boots]

Seems all was not as media wanted us to believe,who can you trust when the media lies;
theage.com.au/news/national/ … 56452.html

[smoker]

Anybody got a link to the actual video ?
I use linux (which can handle Flash 6) but can’t run Internet explorer or Windows media player. Why they enforce that I have no idea (hint - M$ pay them to do it)

[saratoga]

smoker:
Anybody got a link to the actual video ?
I use linux (which can handle Flash 6) but can’t run Internet explorer or Windows media player. Why they enforce that I have no idea (hint - M$ pay them to do it)

Can you handle .flv in VLC ■■ If so you might be able to grab it online via you tube or summat. I’ve had a look and they dont show the source info to grab it and its gone through flash. Which is a real pain

[coffeeholic]

Saratoga:

smoker:
Anybody got a link to the actual video ?
I use linux (which can handle Flash 6) but can’t run Internet explorer or Windows media player. Why they enforce that I have no idea (hint - M$ pay them to do it)

Can you handle .flv in VLC ■■

VLC can, I use it to watch the videos I download from YouTube, I also use THIS to convert them to avi’s

[smoker]

Thanks, I’ll see if I can find it on Youtube then. It’s so annoying when they lock you out for purely financial reasons, but claim it’s a “technical” issue.
The banks the same. Claim I am not using one of their “supported” browsers (I use firefox) but they only “support” internet explorer ! What they really mean is that they have designed the site using IE and so the IE specific tweaks they have used don’t work in any other browser. I thought browsers were supposed to conform to a standard (heh, some hope).

[coffeeholic]

If you find it on YouTube let me know, I haven’t been able to see it yet either.

[smoker]

Is this it ?
Not having seen the other one, it’s hard to say. It involves a merc and a truck anyway.

[mike_ryan_no_really]

smoker, yes that is the clip.

I’m going to put my tin hat on here, and ask a couple of q’s.

Now I’m no expert on the Aussie highway code, but given that they also drive on the correct side of the road, I’ll hazard a guess that they aren’t too different to ours.

Assuming that this is true (or that this incident had happened in god’s own land), of all of you that regard this as a “50/50” why has not one of you that posted stopped to ask:

1. What the hell a 22t truck is doing in the off-side lane of a motorway?
2. Since when was it okay for ANY road user to undertake?
3. How the drivers blind spot is any body’s responsibility but his own?
4. How you might respond to someone that just hit you up the arse implying that, even though you had clearly indicated and executed a lane change BEFORE being struck, that you are somehow jointly responsible for their balls up.

I’m sorry for those of you that choose to delude yourselves, but it will be a cold day in hell before this type of incident is regarded as anything other than entirely the truck drivers fault.

[coffeeholic]

smoker:
Is this it ?
Not having seen the other one, it’s hard to say. It involves a merc and a truck anyway.

Thanks smoker, at last I’ve been able to see it, and save it.

[smoker]

Mike Ryan (no, really):
smoker, yes that is the clip.

I’m going to put my tin hat on here, and ask a couple of q’s.

Now I’m no expert on the Aussie highway code, but given that they also drive on the correct side of the road, I’ll hazard a guess that they aren’t too different to ours.

Assuming that this is true (or that this incident had happened in god’s own land), of all of you that regard this as a “50/50” why has not one of you that posted stopped to ask:

1. What the hell a 22t truck is doing in the off-side lane of a motorway?
2. Since when was it okay for ANY road user to undertake?
3. How the drivers blind spot is any body’s responsibility but his own?
4. How you might respond to someone that just hit you up the arse implying that, even though you had clearly indicated and executed a lane change BEFORE being struck, that you are somehow jointly responsible for their balls up.

I’m sorry for those of you that choose to delude yourselves, but it will be a cold day in hell before this type of incident is regarded as anything other than entirely the truck drivers fault.

1. Who said it was a motorway ? and it looks bigger than 22t to me.
   2)The car is the one undertaking, so I don’t get your conclusion.
2. Psychic drivers needed - apply yesterday !
3. Neither one had completed their lane change. And it wasn’t up the arse, he tagged the offside rear wing, which implies he was alongside slightly.

IMHO, it was the cars fault, for a) undertaking and weaving through the traffic, and b) not checking the offside before pulling out to overtake. The car was also doing about the same speed as the truck - so why wasn’t it in the outside lane instead of weaving about in the inside 2 lanes. You naturally expect faster traffic to be on your right, not inside you.
The truck was pulling into a lane after overtaking, it is the cars job to check their outside before pulling out.
Having said that, the truck driver should have been aware of the car and backed off. He must have seen it from a lot further back doing what it was doing. He was looking in his L/H mirror though, after passing that car with the ■■■■ fog lights !

I don’t have sound on, so if the commentary contradicts me then, that’s why

If anybody here has taken the A30 out of Exeter towards Honiton, where the M5 off ramp joins the A30 is bound to have had a similar experience. You are in the outside lane, you have no choice coming out of exeter. The M5 traffic accelerates up your inside. With the best will in the world, you can’t see cars when they move from lane 1 to lane 2 and they are alongside you. So your LH mirrors says yes, it’s clear, but then some prick appears in the bottom left of your windscreen just as you start moving across. This is while you have your LH indicator going. I hate that junction !

[coffeeholic]

Mike Ryan (no, really):

1. What the hell a 22t truck is doing in the off-side lane of a motorway?

How do you know it’s a motorway? Working on your assumption that their highway code isn’t too different to ours, if it isn’t a motorway then he would be allowed in the outer lane. It’s also possible that the inside lane is exiting just after the tunnel with lanes 2 and 3 going straight on which again would make it OK for him to be out there.

[shade]

In Australia when it comes to 2 or 3 lane highways they don’t apply the ‘keep left’ rule of thumb, they over/undertake as a matter of course.It’s mighty unnerving I can tell you but happens all the time. Also the trucks dont have lesser speed limits and can travel a LOT faster than we can.

[mike_ryan_no_really]

Shade, as I said, I’m no expert on the aussie highway code, so am prepared to bow to your greater knowledge on this one.

Different matter in the UK. In response to how do I know it’s a motorway, the truth is, it really doesn’t matter as in the UK all goods vehicles exceeding 7.5t gvw (and any vehicle drawing a trailer) are prohibited from using the third lane of any dual carriageway as they are debarred from the maximum legal speed and would therefore be potentially guilty of obstruction.

As for the 22t, I’m only going by the commentary, which you said you didn’t get, so fair do’s. (In truth I thought it looked way over that as well). I’m also prepared to accept the point about it potentially being a slip road.

At the point at which the car is struck, it is alongside a saloon car on the inside lane, which would clearly indicate that it had already completed it’s lane change.

Also it is perfectly legal and standard practice to move “out” into the middle lane to overtake traffic on the inside lane, which is what the merc was doing, hence being alongside the car it was overtaking when it was struck.

The truck was moving “inside” to undertake the vehicle the film is being taken from.

Hope this makes my conclusion a little clearer

As for blind spots, mirrors are adjustable. Therefore, depending on who is driving and the position of their mirrors, a blind spot will differ slightly from vehicle to vehicle and driver to driver.

As such, it is the drivers responsibility to check his blind spot(s) before he manoeuvres, not the responsibility of other road users to know where the truck drivers blind spot is.

Long story short, RTA he say no sale, truck drivers fault.

All in all that’s a bloody long response about a hypothetical accident.

[smoker]

Mike Ryan (no, really):
Shade, as I said, I’m no expert on the aussie highway code, so am prepared to bow to your greater knowledge on this one.

Different matter in the UK. In response to how do I know it’s a motorway, the truth is, it really doesn’t matter as in the UK all goods vehicles exceeding 7.5t gvw (and any vehicle drawing a trailer) are prohibited from using the third lane of any dual carriageway as they are debarred from the maximum legal speed and would therefore be potentially guilty of obstruction.

< insert family fortunes buzzer here >
I think you mean motorways. There is no such restriction on a dual carriageway (according to the highway code or the official DSA theory test for drivers of large vehicles). This is in addition to the fact that the speed limit may be set lower than 70mph.

[coffeeholic]

Mike Ryan (no, really):
in the UK all goods vehicles exceeding 7.5t gvw (and any vehicle drawing a trailer) are prohibited from using the third lane of any dual carriageway as they are debarred from the maximum legal speed and would therefore be potentially guilty of obstruction.

Since when? The restriction for trucks in the outer lane of a 3, or more, lane road only applies to motorways. A couple of weeks ago I was on the A55 in North Wales and on an uphill section I came up behind a slow moving truck in lane 1 with another crawling past him in lane 2. i indicated to pull into lane 3 and a car a little way back flashed me out. After I pulled back across to lane one, following the overtaking manoeuvre, the car came past and it was a North Wales Traffic Police car. Now remembering they do not like truck drivers and have a chief constable who is as mad as a hatter and encourages his officers to prosecute every minor driving offence, don’t you think they might have nicked me if it was wrong for me to be in lane 3?

Mike Ryan (no, really):
The truck was moving “inside” to undertake the vehicle the film is being taken from.

Or, he was moving back to the left after an overtaking manoeuvre, which is normal practice, and had no intention of passing the ‘camera car’ as he could see it was clearly going faster than he was.

[nej]

A nice bit of anti truck reporting from our “Friends” down under and as “Flying Fenman” says how many times do you leave a gap for some buffoon in a car to decide the gap is “for them to fill” and not your “braking distance” to be able to stop safely:

As for the driver running at 43mph in a “40” limit you asked for the criticism you got as the law says 40 is the limit not 43 or more is it any wonder the true professional drivers get a bad press when things go wrong!

We have all been there and done it as they say but don,t expect sympathy when you admit to running illegal (even by 3mph) as one guy said you might as well run on the limiter as it is more comfortable with your foot on the floor

I have said in the past just run down the A14 to Felix. and see the antics of the 56mph brigade what the hell is wrong with sticking to 50mph is the extra 6mph a target to be met for the benefit of the boss as many times you see them at the port a few wagons in front of you when you arrive so they have maybe saved 3 or 4 minutes but at what risk to their living and the other road users not to mention the bad press we get when something goes wrong

Even if we don,t like the limits it is the wrong way (exceeding the limits) to try and get the law amended by breaking it, burglars do it all the time but the law still ain,t been changed to suit them so why do it as the boss will dispense of your services when you lose your licence so why risk your livelihood to save a few minutes

Ad Infinitum

[mike_ryan_no_really]

OK so we like the hypothetical discussion.

Unfotunately, I have to depart now, however I will return to conclude this matter…