Car crashes

[Frank Beck Banned Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Beck]

Call me an armchair investigative spectator. I am infatuated with the root cause of any mistake, accident, or catastrophe. The final effects don't interest me as much as "How the heck did this happen?!"

Current journalism fails on so many levels to report the details of accidents. (Not "accidents" at all; a human was most likely careless and caused it.)

Anyone know of a U.S. online resource where investigative reports are available for local crashes? My interest is not merely curiosity. It's to gather information so that I can be more informed, change my behavior, and help others change theirs.

Here's a great example where local journalists refuse to do their job because I suspect it may have cast a bad light on a young man who turned in front of a dump truck, lost his life, and almost killed his partner.

Paramedic killed, others injured after a semi-truck crashes into Salt River ambulance (kold.com)


Without speculating too wildly it would appear that our culture has become quite comfortable being passive voyeurs with little interest or regard for understanding the cause of tragedies.

[bob joyce 2.4L Find all posts View Profile Close bob joyce]

Yes. I can tell you firsthand.
I am a retired Operating Engineer.
On the 580 Freeway in Richmond Ca. My job was to control the excavation. (Approximately 20' below existing grade.)
The Cal Trans Engineers had written survey information on the K rails every 50'. The live traffic was running against these K rails. I could have reached over the K rail and touched the cars.
I spent several days at these K rails processing and checking in with the Cal Trans Information.
The morning traffic had a lot of collisions.
I saw first-hand why a lot of these collisions occurred.
People were driving perfectly like peas in a pod and all of a sudden, a person that was day dreaming would "wakeup" and panic.
They would either jerk the wheel or hit the brakes because they were frightened, and it would case a pile up.
I know this because I was looking right into their eyes when it happened.
On another freeway Highway 4 in Hercules Ca. A totally different reason that I was aware of was detour design as a freeway was being constructed.
I had to design a transition that would take traffic essentially over the side of a 20' 3:1 slope. We
had new road constructed at the higher grade and had to bring the traffic down onto the old existing grade.
The first consideration was that the driver was not to get that strange feeling going over that elevation change that would cause a panic reaction.
That the driver, visually would not be over concerned.
That as the car arrived at the lower grade the vertical curve was not so abrupt that a coffee cup or items on the passenger seat would not fall down into the pedal box area.
Not on my jobs but I do know of other freeway jobs that were in the interim detour phase that they ran traffic onto existing road that banked (superelevation) incorrectly.

[Frank Beck Banned Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Beck]

Bob,

I appreciate that but I already know the underlying cause! And I'm going to break it down to its very basic element: Sin!

I'm looking for in-depth, online accident investigation reports; like the FAA does in the aviation industry.

[bob joyce 2.4L Find all posts View Profile Close bob joyce]

as to a resource for reports. I know a guy that would know but i have lost contact with him.
beware: i know that the engineers would write the report that they want you to see..
you are very resource full and i bet you will find whatever documentation.
i am sure there is such data
when they vet their designs they use such data

[soterik HTH....! Find all posts View Profile Close soterik]

Wonder how this happened....

[Crankys Paint]

Easy. US Govt payroll person. They damn sure dont work.

[jaudette3 Really? Find all posts View Profile Close jaudette3]

I grew up on a ranch in a rural part of central Texas. I remember an incident that occurred when I was around six years old. Santa Fe railroad trains used to high ball through the area and an entire family was killed at an unmarked crossing. Following that they installed the usual elaborate warning devices. I remember asking my father why they hadn't installed the devices before the accident. I was truly baffled - the logic of a child,



There's proactive and reactive behavior of course and part of the problem is a lack of creative thinking proactively. It's great to learn from experience but it's even better to anticipate things. Not sure where sin comes in though. I doubt there is malicious intent very often

Speaking of the aviation industry, The Flight Channel does a great job of documenting failures.

Cheers,
John

[flatsixer aka rstarga Find all posts View Profile Close flatsixer]

Road conditions are what they are, unless a chunk of road disappears right in front of you.
IMHO Principle causes:
Poorly trained drivers
Inattentive drivers
intoxicated drivers
Drivers with a poor understanding of physics

[Frank Beck Banned Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Beck]

Not sure where sin comes in though. I doubt there is malicious intent very often

Sin does not necessarily include "intent". Humans are still culpable when we fall short of God's holy demands. A driver is distracted and blows a red light killing all 6 family members in a van. Manslaughter does not take intent and laws are broken. Sin is sin.

Boy I would surely love to go deeper into this but I'll save it for another thread.

[bob joyce 2.4L Find all posts View Profile Close bob joyce]

not so fast....
i can think of 2 projects that were death traps and they turned a blind eye to the obvious..
for staging, an off ramp was utilized as a detour for main line.
the off ramp superelevation was designed for 35 miles an hour. and the detour speed was 65.
almost every morning there was a bunch of derbies from the nights wrecks.
the cars would kiss the K rail.
then, there was the infamous Bay Bridge "s" Curve.
Same reason for wrecks. The superelevation did not match the tabular speed/radius criteria.

[Steve Shea 2.0L Find all posts View Profile Close Steve Shea]

Annually we lose people who feel the need to ride bison, pet grizzlies and swim in the hot pots of Yellowstone. With the awareness demonstrated by these fools I wonder what they would be like behind the wheel. You can't fix stupid. Yet pot is legal and many pop a road coke for the ride home which enhances the odds for a wreck.Poor judgement is the cause of most 'accidents'. Most. But it is entertaining to see natural selection at work.

[jaudette3 Really? Find all posts View Profile Close jaudette3]

Sin does not necessarily include "intent". Humans are still culpable when we fall short of God's holy demands. A driver is distracted and blows a red light killing all 6 family members in a van. Manslaughter does not take intent and laws are broken. Sin is sin.

Boy I would surely love to go deeper into this but I'll save it for another thread.

Religion may be one area to stay away from in this wide open forum. It could cause some real friction.

Cheers,
John

[Frank Beck Banned Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Beck]

Religion may be one area to stay away from in this wide open forum. It could cause some real friction.

Cheers,
John

One finds out just how valuable or superficial a relationship is when hard topics are debated. Friction isn't necessarily bad John. It's ok to agree to disagree.

[jaudette3 Really? Find all posts View Profile Close jaudette3]

Oh I love to disagree, you have no idea. As long as folks continue to use their human brain and not their reptilian brain.

[70SATMan 2.2L Find all posts View Profile Close 70SATMan]

Oh I love to disagree, you have no idea. As long as folks continue to use their human brain and not their reptilian brain.

and that there my friend is the perfect counter to Frank's position.

[Frank Beck Banned Find all posts View Profile Close Frank Beck]

Reptilian brain, penis envy, or other fanciful theories aside, my quest only involves finding a good nationwide source for automobile accident reports.
Thanks.