Post Car Crash Feelings

kluivert

Big Nelly wrote:

In Dublin now but grew up on roads called "the bog road" etc, each side was a 10ft drop into a ...guess.....bog and the road was just about the width of the car. If you did make a mistake there it was bye bye Big Nelly:p

Hey Big Nelly

So you know the road am on about. The one on the Carrick - Dundalk road. The council re tarmac the surface, its now smooth no pot holes but its a roller coaster ride - up and down and up and down. The drop is now about 15ft a lorry got it left wheels on the verge and landed in the bog. Upsidedown.

Never seen a lorry upsidedown before. I must take a picture of this road so people will understand my point about building safer roads. No crap people the drop is a good 10-15 ft. If you come slight off the tarmac your straight down, theres no hope of getting the car back on course.

And I understand your point. When I got my provisional license I took 20 lessons before getting into my car. Part of the Insurance agreement with AXA at the time. It was too many lessons but better educated about the driving techniques than just getting in the car and driving.

jamieh

Hey all,

OP here.

We're starting to get into the fun part, insurance etc etc.

We've let the insurance know about the accident. We rang the dealer we bought the car from, it was only bought in Janurary so it's about 2 months old.

The salesman wanted to know that if the cost of repair was equal to half the value of the car is it the equvilent of a write off. ie. If it cost €12,000 to repair a car worth €24,0000 do you automatically have to get a new car? He couldn't remember what the insurance companies called it.

Does anyone know what it would be called??

Boggle

Regarding statistics for accidents - to the best of my knowledge, the records that are there show that L-drivers constitute a LOWER percentage of drivers in fatal accidents than their percentage of overall drivers, i.e. an L-driver is less likely to be involved in a fatal crash than a full driver. Where controversy arises though is that the Gardai don't always record the licence 'status' at an accident and the L-haters naturally assume that everyone of these is a learner driver. This is my recollection of some posts here some time ago, so no link I'm afraid.

Cheers Padriag! Do those stats show a per capita figure or is it just fewer crashes involved L plates than non l-plates?? Does anyone know a link to any of this info??

Big Nelly

Padraig Mor wrote:

Re your brother having 'hardly ever driven' prior to his Theory Test - surely he should never have driven?

Just to clear this up, he didnt, had no license so no insurance etc so couldnt drive. I dropped him off and then picked him up, when he got license my mum then put him on her insurance and I brought him out for lessons......he never drives without a full license drivre because he is on his second provisonal which as far as I know he is not legal when only on second but could be wrong. Thats the way you are supposed to do it. I am talking about the people that dont bother with lessons and just hop in car and off they go, or they get 2-3 lessons so they learn basically how to start/stop the car and off with them

redman

jamieh wrote:

I had a car crash lastnight.

Has anyone here had a crash and how did they feel after it??

Well sorry to hear that Jamieh, you'll get over the emotions in time.

ALL of us we learners/newly licenced drivers at some time and it's good you've escaped unhurt (except perhaps your pride and some cashflow)

There is nothing like this experience to mature your skills.

We are all human and subject to accidents whether we have been driving for 1 month or 50 years.

Just move on with it...

jamieh

Cheers redman......

Does anyone here have a good knowledge of motor insurance?? I have a question thats posted 3-4 posts up

Padraig Mor

Boggle wrote:

Cheers Padriag! Do those stats show a per capita figure or is it just fewer crashes involved L plates than non l-plates?? Does anyone know a link to any of this info??

Again, this is what I remember from posts here maybe 1.5 - 2 years ago so no link. I would imagine the details are in a Garda report .....somewhere. From what I recall the stats showed that say, 10% of fatal accident drivers were L-drivers, but L-drivers comprise 20% of all drivers on the road - these figures are off the top of my head but you get the picture.

Padraig Mor

Big Nelly wrote:

Just to clear this up, he didnt, had no license so no insurance etc so couldnt drive. I dropped him off and then picked him up, when he got license my mum then put him on her insurance and I brought him out for lessons......he never drives without a full license drivre because he is on his second provisonal which as far as I know he is not legal when only on second but could be wrong. Thats the way you are supposed to do it. I am talking about the people that dont bother with lessons and just hop in car and off they go, or they get 2-3 lessons so they learn basically how to start/stop the car and off with them

He can drive on his own on 2nd prov., but not 1st or 3rd......or 4th, 5th etc! Personally, I didn't really use my first provo so got ~10 lessons in last few months of it. Drove on my own on second but never on my first.

gbh

The call to ban learner drivers or L plate drivers is just a silly knee jerk reaction designed to penalise a section of society who bear no responsibility for most crashes on our roads. It's the equivalent of blaiming the Jews for the Reichstag fire or saying all foreigners can't be trusted.

How many wrecks that you see on the news as a result of a fatal crash have L plates on them? I've seen quite a few such wrecks and I can honestly say I have never seen a single L plate on any of them.

One of the reasons is that people are far more wary around cars with L plates on them. However they are not so wary around people without L plates.

L plate drivers are an easy target but the wrong target. It's people who are over confident and mostly with years of experience who are involved in or cause 99% of accidents.

padraigmyers

jamieh wrote:

Hey all,

OP here.

We're starting to get into the fun part, insurance etc etc.

We've let the insurance know about the accident. We rang the dealer we bought the car from, it was only bought in Janurary so it's about 2 months old.

The salesman wanted to know that if the cost of repair was equal to half the value of the car is it the equvilent of a write off. ie. If it cost €12,000 to repair a car worth €24,0000 do you automatically have to get a new car? He couldn't remember what the insurance companies called it.

Does anyone know what it would be called??

I have hear this described as a economic write off as opposed to a mechanical write off. For a mechanical write off the chassis of the car must be broken by a mechanic so that the car can never be repaired.

In an economic write off where the cost of repair is too high (not sure if this is half the value though), you will get compensated for the value of the car, you then have the option of buying back your wrecked car and repairing it yourself. If you don't buy it back the insurance company have crash repair places which take these damaged repairables off their hands at next to nothing. Usually the guy who comes to inspect the damage will put a value on your damaged car. This value is called a salvage value, and is the price that you can buy the car from the insurance company at.

Insurance companies often don't mention that you can buy your written-off car back from them, so if you intend doing this mention it to them.

shroomfox

alot started to drive on Cavan roads which are the worst in this country.

That's not true. Because of Cavan's bad reputation the roads have improved incredibly over the last year. Cavan has some of the best roads in the North of the country. I can't remember when I've last seen a pothole, and the roads have been widened significantly.

Cerdito

One thing I can't understand about "perpetual" L-drivers: How do they keep driving on provisional licences without taking a test?

I thought you had to take a test to be granted third and subsequent provisionals. Do they just apply for a test and then cancel?

Big Nelly

shroomfox wrote:

That's not true. Because of Cavan's bad reputation the roads have improved incredibly over the last year. Cavan has some of the best roads in the North of the country. I can't remember when I've last seen a pothole, and the roads have been widened significantly.

I said when I started to drive, about 10 years ago and believe me the roads where brutal then, as you said they have got alot better but it took the 10 years to get there

Tobias Greeshman

BigNelly wrote:

What??? so you cant tick the same box or some other prov driver? thats another bullsh*t excuse. I haven't a clue what she ticked to be honest but if she can get a test why can't someone else??

Well I think the reason most people don't click it is that you could be offered to do a test tomorrow or next week. The main point is that you are not guaranteed a set amount of notice, so people may not be able to get time off work also if you don't take it you could be waiting a serious longer amount of time to get offered a test again. I got my test in under 3 months this way and I was lucky enough to get a decent two weeks notice.

Boggle

How many wrecks that you see on the news as a result of a fatal crash have L plates on them? I've seen quite a few such wrecks and I can honestly say I have never seen a single L plate on any of them.

Alot of L-plate drivers have, in fact, no L-plates!! Lads put them up for a week and then take them down...


Interestingly - in the following tables do not classify drivers based on licence types so I wonder do the figures actually exist... (this is a few years old so again I'm not aware that they've changed it)

http://www.nra.ie/PublicationsResources/DownloadableDocumentation/RoadSafety/file,1405,en.PDF#search='percentage of fatal crashes have provisional licence'

padraigmyers

Aside from the surface of the roads, just the amount of bends on Irish roads is madness, and I would think a major factor in accidents.
I know there is noting that can be done about the bends, but a great idea I saw when over in New Zealand and Australia was these signs before you enter every bend giving the average speed the bend can be taken at (if that speed is less than the speed limit). It means that if you are driving a road you don't know, you always know how sharp the bend is before you enter it. As well as making the road safer it also saves time, because you are not unnecessarly breaking for what may be a very sharp bend but turns out to be a long sweeping one.
I don't know why something like that can't be implemented here.

Selik

padraigmyers wrote:

Aside from the surface of the roads, just the amount of bends on Irish roads is madness, and I would think a major factor in accidents.
I know there is noting that can be done about the bends, but a great idea I saw when over in New Zealand and Australia was these signs before you enter every bend giving the average speed the bend can be taken at (if that speed is less than the speed limit). It means that if you are driving a road you don't know, you always know how sharp the bend is before you enter it. As well as making the road safer it also saves time, because you are not unnecessarly breaking for what may be a very sharp bend but turns out to be a long sweeping one.
I don't know why something like that can't be implemented here.

A very good point.

I've just returned from those two countries. I did alot of driving in both (particularly NZ) and those corner speed indicators are great. NZ especially has alot of seriously bendy roads in places. Like you said even if you don't know the road (which I didn't alot of the time) you can drive at a normal and safe pace without having to worry about getting surprised by a hairpin bend or in the opposite case you'll have indicators at 85kph in which case you know it's only a curve in the road as opposed to a bend.

It definitely should be implemented here.

peasant

padraigmyers wrote:

Aside from the surface of the roads, just the amount of bends on Irish roads is madness, and I would think a major factor in accidents.
I know there is noting that can be done about the bends, but a great idea I saw when over in New Zealand and Australia was these signs before you enter every bend giving the average speed the bend can be taken at (if that speed is less than the speed limit). It means that if you are driving a road you don't know, you always know how sharp the bend is before you enter it. As well as making the road safer it also saves time, because you are not unnecessarly breaking for what may be a very sharp bend but turns out to be a long sweeping one.
I don't know why something like that can't be implemented here.

Sure, didn't Ireland do one better?

When they put up the new km/h speed limit signs the eejits had waaay too many of them and they made damn sure that EVERY SINGLE dangerous bend / junction got a brand spanking new 100 km/h sign.

So just as you are about to slow down because there is a dodgy stretch of road coming up, that bloody 100 km/h sign almost "forces" you to speed up again ...and if it's not the sign, then it's the idiot behind you, who is convinced that 100 means at least 100 ...whatever the circumstances.

Whoever oversaw the placement for these signs needs to be beaten around the head with every single one of them that was wrongly placed ...he'd get a royal beating !!

BrianD3

Going back to the original post - bad luck, sounds like it was quite a genuine accident and not caused by stupid driving. Still, you can always learn from these experiences. You probably feel ashamed about what you've done but don't beat yourself up too much about it. Judging by the thread you are comprehensively insured which is lucky. When I started driving I was driving brand new cars as a named driver but only had 3rd party insurance as that's all my parent's insurance company would cover me for.

I don't know what it's like to crash a car but a few years ago I did have a couple of close calls on icy roads while insured 3rd party. So I know the sensation of losing control of a car and getting the "OH F*CK!" feeling before managing to regain control and breathing a sigh of relief

jamieh

Thanks for the encouraging words BrianD3, yes the insurance is fully comp. I got behind the wheel on my Dads car today, felt kinda weird but the sooner I did it the better I guess!! The spot it happened is only a mile from my house so I pass it all the time, its horrible to see where it happened, seeing the skid marks etc. I know it sounds bad but its better having skid marks there instead of flowers and a cross. The whole shock of it has worn of by now. Just have to put the last 24\36 hours behind me and move on...tommorows another day I guess!!

shroomfox

Big Nelly wrote:

I said when I started to drive, about 10 years ago and believe me the roads where brutal then, as you said they have got alot better but it took the 10 years to get there

Woops, apologies, must have misread you. Yeah, they were brutal.

And why did I say in the last year? Man, I've got to take my head out of this cabbage.

Big Nelly

padraigmyers wrote:

Aside from the surface of the roads, just the amount of bends on Irish roads is madness, and I would think a major factor in accidents.
I know there is noting that can be done about the bends, but a great idea I saw when over in New Zealand and Australia was these signs before you enter every bend giving the average speed the bend can be taken at (if that speed is less than the speed limit). It means that if you are driving a road you don't know, you always know how sharp the bend is before you enter it. As well as making the road safer it also saves time, because you are not unnecessarly breaking for what may be a very sharp bend but turns out to be a long sweeping one.
I don't know why something like that can't be implemented here.

This is gas, so you are blaming the turns on the road now? well really if you need a sign to tell you how fast you should be going around a cornor you souldn't be on the road. If you don't know how to control or handle a car then you are a danger to yourself and everyone else on the road so you should get the hell off the road before you kill someone

padraigmyers

Big Nelly wrote:

This is gas, so you are blaming the turns on the road now? well really if you need a sign to tell you how fast you should be going around a cornor you souldn't be on the road. If you don't know how to control or handle a car then you are a danger to yourself and everyone else on the road so you should get the hell off the road before you kill someone

So you think this would be a bad idea that has no merit then? Talk about missing the point, get a clue mate.

Big Nelly

padraigmyers wrote:

So you think this would be a bad idea that has no merit then? Talk about missing the point, get a clue mate.

What merits? wasting more money that could be used on upgrading the roads to start putting up thousands of signs to tell what speed to go around a cornor? you missed the point, if you need someone to tell you what speed to go around a cornor you shouldn't really be driving the car in the first place. It would suggest to me that if you need these signs you can't control your car etc and you are a danger on the road

padraigmyers

Big Nelly wrote:

What merits? wasting more money that could be used on upgrading the roads to start putting up thousands of signs to tell what speed to go around a cornor? you missed the point, if you need someone to tell you what speed to go around a cornor you shouldn't really be driving the car in the first place. It would suggest to me that if you need these signs you can't control your car etc and you are a danger on the road

I have driven various different cars (saloons, estates, 4x4's, campervans) in about 10 different countries. I have no problem navigating bends or controlling my car.

New Zealand has very similar roads to ours. Lots of small roads with lots of bends. When I was over there I was driving a hulking campervan, now if you are going into a bend when you are driving one of these you need to slow down a LOT in case the bend is sharp, because these things DON'T handle at all. Having these signs told you about the bend before you entered it, on a journey with a lot of bends (and with the mountains over there, there were lots) these signs could knock about 25% off the journey time (espically at night).

These signs forewarn you about the sharpness of the corner. If you say you have never gone around a bend on a road you don't know either too fast or too slow you are lying (or psychic).

Big Nelly

padraigmyers wrote:

I have driven various different cars (saloons, estates, 4x4's, campervans) in about 10 different countries. I have no problem navigating bends or controlling my car.

Well done, so have I....arnt we great:D

padraigmyers wrote:

New Zealand has very similar roads to ours. Lots of small roads with lots of bends. When I was over there I was driving a hulking campervan, now if you are going into a bend when you are driving one of these you need to slow down a LOT in case the bend is sharp, because these things DON'T handle at all. Having these signs told you about the bend before you entered it, on a journey with a lot of bends (and with the mountains over there, there were lots) these signs could knock about 25% off the journey time (espically at night).

Well as I said above this shows you where not in control of the vehicle, from what you are saying you where going around cornors(even with those great signs) and more or less losing control of the vehicule.

Again as you mentioned the handling on that car was terrible so of course you would think you would realise this and take it slower around the roads till you felt comfortable in it and that you could control it. Now are you saying that the signs has 10-12 differnent speeds levels for every type of vehicle that could come across the cornor? if not they are useless because every type of car, jeep, lorry etc can take cornors at differnet speeds so these great signs are the biggest waste of time and money

padraigmyers wrote:

These signs forewarn you about the sharpness of the corner. If you say you have never gone around a bend on a road you don't know either too fast or too slow you are lying (or psychic).

Nope, sorry I know how to control my car and how to judge a cornor, also you can actually brake when going round a cornor, you dont just have to weave all over the place out of control

Lying? psychic? neither, just now how to drive properly

peasant

Big Nelly ...you're talking rubbish.

The non-handling campervan is an extreme but perfect example.

Driving one of those yokes at night on an unknown, bendy road, you cannot judge/ guess / anticipate the bends, so you have to be prepared for the worst.

(Because one thing you certainly can't do is break in the corner ...bye,bye motorhome)

So you either end up at driving at 40 - 50 km/h all the time ...or in the ditch.


To a lesser degree this applies to any other sort of vehicle.

So yes, these indication signs are a brilliant idea.

padraigmyers

Big Nelly wrote:

Well done, so have I....arnt we great:D

Yawn.... You were classing me as a **** driver, I was just making the point. Have you seen these signs on your travels?

Big Nelly wrote:

Again as you mentioned the handling on that car was terrible so of course you would think you would realise this and take it slower around the roads till you felt comfortable in it and that you could control it. Now are you saying that the signs has 10-12 different speeds levels for every type of vehicle that could come across the cornor? if not they are useless because every type of car, jeep, lorry etc can take cornors at differnet speeds so these great signs are the biggest waste of time and money

No. Just one speed, you learn after the first few bends where fit in here. In a car you can go about 30km more than the sign says safely, in a campervan, you go about the same as the sign says.

Big Nelly wrote:

Nope, sorry I know how to control my car and how to judge a cornor, also you can actually brake when going round a cornor, you dont just have to weave all over the place out of control.

Look, I've been driving on Irish roads for a long time, I don't weave all over the place out of control, your making a lot of assumptions about my driving here. Its just that over in Oz and NZ these signs really did make driving at night on roads I didn't know a lot easier.

I have no interest in getting into an argument about my driving here. I was just making a point. Fair enough you don't agree. I was just putting it out there. I'd be confident that any one who has actually been over there and seen and used these sign would side with me.

Big Nelly

padraigmyers wrote:

I have no interest in getting into an argument about my driving here. I was just making a point. Fair enough you don't agree. I was just putting it out there. I'd be confident that any one who has actually been over there and seen and used these sign would side with me.

How do you know I havent been over there????:D

padraigmyers

Big Nelly wrote:

How do you know I havent been over there????:D

Becasue you said that you would need a different rating for every type of vechicle. Anyone who had driven over there would know thats not true.