Should there be some sort of competency test...

[Benzmanc]

....for drivers during later life????

Three dead after car pulling caravan in wrong direction on motorway crashed | Metro News

I think there should be, not an outright driving test but some sort of check at least.

 

[AMGeed]

Yes.
You have to re new your driving licence at 70 so that should be a good time to take an eye test and a paid for test for general competency.
I think you only have to declare that you are fit and not suffering from things like epilepsy and conditions that would affect your driving. But no test to see if you are competent.

My brother and I informed the DVLA that my 89 year old father was unfit to drive some time ago. His eyesight was appalling but he just carried on. It was a blow to him, but the consequences of letting him carry on were too great.

 

[Dryce]

I think there should be, not an outright driving test but some sort of check at least.

There are reports the vehicle had foreign plates.

Consider that means there's a good chance that the driver had a foreign licence issued outside UK jurisdiction.

And as regards UK tests - I think drivers should have to do a retest every 10 years. Perhaps with an exemption if they have passed a AIM or equivalent accredited advanced programme within the previous 2 or 3 years.

 

[Benzmanc]

There are reports the vehicle had foreign plates.

Consider that means there's a good chance that the driver had a foreign licence issued outside UK jurisdiction.

And as regards UK tests - I think drivers should have to do a retest every 10 years. Perhaps with an exemption if they have passed a AIM or equivalent accredited advanced programme within the previous 2 or 3 years.

I think a retest every 10 years would be a tad too much. Something along the lines of a competency/mental capacity test etc a bit like the medicals i have to go through to drive a HGV. Maybe a test at 70, 75, 80 and then each year after that. If the driver in the article had any sense at all, foreign licence or not then they would have noticed that all the traffic was coming towards them and not forgetting that to get to lane 3 from a slip road they have to cross the entire carriageway first.

 

[st13phil]

Happened not that far from me - occasionally I use that section of the M40 to get home from work at about that time

This is pure speculation, but my guess would be that the driver of the car & caravan would normally drive on the right, and may have entered the M40 carriageway at J7 from the A329 as that's the only junction on that section where there could be an easy to make turn onto the off slip in the wrong direction.

Tragic for all involved

 

[markjay]

...This is pure speculation, but my guess would be that the driver of the car & caravan would normally drive on the right, and may have entered the M40 carriageway at J7 from the A329 as that's the only junction on that section where there could be an easy to make turn onto the off slip in the wrong direction.

This can happen, especially to a foreign driver, and his/her driving on the outer lane reinforces it (i.e. they thought they were driving on the inner lane).

But what baffles me (and this is where his/her old age might come in?) is why did he/she carry on? How did they not notice something was wrong? If they crashed while trying to reach the hard shoulder, or while stopped in the outer lane, that would have sort of made sense... but driving against traffic? Was the driver confused?

 

[Dryce]

But what baffles me (and this is where his/her old age might come in?) is why did he/she carry on? How did they not notice something was wrong? If they crashed while trying to reach the hard shoulder, or while stopped in the outer lane, that would have sort of made sense... but driving against traffic? Was the driver confused?

I think it's plausible that an amount of panic would be involved - combined with disorientation.

Crossing lanes of oncoming traffic to get back to the hard shoulder wouldn't be that straightforward. Stopping may not seem like a better solution. The driver would be overwhelmed by the problem of the dense oncoming traffic. Moving forward in the hope of finding a haven in the central barrier or a gap in the traffic might actually have seemed logical.

It might be more obvious to the rest of us that stopping is a better solution than moving forward if you feel you can't reach the hard shoulder. Watching a video is different from being caught in what was effectively a terrifying maelstrom.

 

[John N]

....for drivers during later life????

Three dead after car pulling caravan in wrong direction on motorway crashed | Metro News

I think there should be, not an outright driving test but some sort of check at least.

What I can't understand is how the Driver of the Subaru managed to get his car AND a Caravan onto the Motorway???

Motorway Slip Roads are designed to force you to travel in the Direction that the Slip Road is pointing, even a small Car would have to stop at the end of the Slip Road, wait for a Gap in Traffic, (My experiences on the M40 = No Gaps very often) then turn hard right, with a Caravan on the back that must have been some feat not noticing that there must be something terribly wrong!

 

[st13phil]

I think it's plausible that an amount of panic would be involved - combined with disorientation.

I think that's almost a certainty, with the disorientation reinforcing the panic and vice versa.

In certain circumstances the human brain takes a good while to work out what's really going on when there was an expectation that something else is going on. One only has to look at the catastrophic incidents in aviation that result from reality being out of sync with expectation and perception to see that it can happen even to highly trained, experienced and otherwise competent people.

 

[brucemillar]

The basic issue with re-testing or competency testing is that it is unlikely to stop this sort of incident. You would need an indication that the driver was not capable of driving safely at all times. Not just holidays etc. Would it do that? Or, do we say that anybody over the age of xx has their license removed (not sure how this works with visitors to the UK)

One can only guess that this driver had some kind of brain fade (along with the passenger) to have neither recognise the carnage they were causing.

I see more questions than answers here given what we do not know and possibly never will.

I think a previous poster is correct. How were they able to join the motorway in the wrong direction, with no apparent indication to them that they had done so.

FYI: overheight lorries still (despite signage, alarms and barriers) still manage to drive into the Blackwall Tunnel. Scary.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[st13phil]

If my hunch is correct, then this Google Street View shot is where they would have made their ultimately fatal turn onto the off-slip in the wrong direction.

Note the signage on the left that could be mistaken for indicating that the junction on the right (actually the right-turn junction from the off-slip to the A329) is the entry to the M40 London bound. Once that mistake was made - if indeed it was - disorientation would take over very quickly because the driver would not understand why they were confronted by oncoming traffic.

While I'm a firm believer in periodic re-testing to maintain a valid Drivers Licence, I also agree with Bruce that any such assessment of driver capability would be highly unlikely to prevent events like this.

 

[Benzmanc]

I would think that the current hazard awareness test should be implemented for those with advancing years. Whilst I agree that this would not completely eradicate incidents like this, it would give a general idea of the drivers competency.

The infrastructure is already in place, it wouldn’t be difficult to implement.

 

[BEJ]

When I reached the ripe old age of 77, I decided to put myself through the one hour assessment provided by the I.A.M.
This was purely to get an informed opinion of the standard of my driving and to prove to my wife that all the other drivers on the road were idiots, not me.
By the way, when the report came through,my driving was classed as excellent. Marked by an ex royal protection squad policeman.

 

[littleowl]

This incident was horrendous, and my first thought was how on earth did the driver even get to that situation? But - did any of you watch the series '100 year old driving school' - where centenarians or thereabouts were volunteered by their frustrated families to be assessed by driving instructors. Their driving skills (or lack of) were appalling and not the kind of people you would want to come across on the roads (especially on a motorbike ... ). While there was an element of humour to it, many of the drivers were quite arrogant and determined to carry on regardless. For example, when a broken wing mirror was pointed out to one individual, he replied, 'well I don't use it anyway', and said he often drove on the wrong side of the road so he could see oncoming traffic ... . I believe out of all of them, only one driver seemed to have competence. The rest shouldn't have been on the roads.

 

[Flyinspanner]

Sadly, it looks like they were foreign nationals, so would not have been “tested” by any UK requirements in later life (if it happens).

God knows why they didn’t just stop as soon as they noticed they were on the wrong side - tragic.

 

[BTB 500]

If my hunch is correct, then this Google Street View shot is where they would have made their ultimately fatal turn onto the off-slip in the wrong direction.

Note the signage on the left that could be mistaken for indicating that the junction on the right (actually the right-turn junction from the off-slip to the A329) is the entry to the M40 London bound. Once that mistake was made - if indeed it was - disorientation would take over very quickly because the driver would not understand why they were confronted by oncoming traffic.

I think that's quite plausible, although there are no less than SEVEN 'no entry' signs on that junction so you'd hope a competent/alert driver would have spotted at least one of them in broad daylight:

 

[Petrol Pete]

Yes.
You have to re new your driving licence at 70 so that should be a good time to take an eye test and a paid for test for general competency.
I think you only have to declare that you are fit and not suffering from things like epilepsy and conditions that would affect your driving. But no test to see if you are competent.

My brother and I informed the DVLA that my 89 year old father was unfit to drive some time ago. His eyesight was appalling but he just carried on. It was a blow to him, but the consequences of letting him carry on were too great.

Irish by all accounts. so basically the same as us.

 

[Petrol Pete]

This incident was horrendous, and my first thought was how on earth did the driver even get to that situation? But - did any of you watch the series '100 year old driving school' - where centenarians or thereabouts were volunteered by their frustrated families to be assessed by driving instructors. Their driving skills (or lack of) were appalling and not the kind of people you would want to come across on the roads (especially on a motorbike ... ). While there was an element of humour to it, many of the drivers were quite arrogant and determined to carry on regardless. For example, when a broken wing mirror was pointed out to one individual, he replied, 'well I don't use it anyway', and said he often drove on the wrong side of the road so he could see oncoming traffic ... . I believe out of all of them, only one driver seemed to have competence. The rest shouldn't have been on the roads.

I think that's quite plausible, although there are no less than SEVEN 'no entry' signs on that junction so you'd hope a competent/alert driver would have spotted at least one of them in broad daylight:

View attachment 80597

If you are correct I can 'sort of' understand how the mistake could have been made on this type of junction, because since the incident I have joined (and left,obviously)the motorway on the way two and from work a few times and for the life of me I can see no way that I could join the wrong carriageway on either without some major 2 or 3 point turning and that's without a caravan in tow. The mind boggles.

 

[littleowl]

I just read that they had been in another accident 5 days previously which was under investigation, and in this incident had driven about 5 miles before crashing??! Apparently a witness said they looked like they were doing about 70mph. It seems bizarre

 

[st13phil]

I think that's quite plausible, although there are no less than SEVEN 'no entry' signs on that junction so you'd hope a competent/alert driver would have spotted at least one of them in broad daylight

I agree about the 'no entry' signs and there's also the small matter of the direction arrows painted on the road as you proceed down the slip road in the wrong direction - if indeed it was this slip road that they entered the main carriageway from, as it's just my speculation.

However, I'll return to the comparison with aviation where the world around is telling the pilot that they are in situation "A", but the pilot still proceeds as though they are in situation "B" because that's what they expected to be in and they missed the first clue that they weren't. The human brain does strange things when confronted with a situation that doesn't match what it expects given the immediately preceding events.

Of course, we could find out that the driver involved in this incident was drunk, or otherwise incapacitated through some sort of medical event.