MOT / ACC on MC speeders

**candor** · 10th August 2006, 03:46

From MOT June 2006 speed factsheet

"contributing factor in fatal crashes for 23% of car and van drivers and 41% of motorcyclists. 10% of truck drivers involved in fatal crashes were speeding".

ACC has one too (a virtual book that must have swallowed a couple of wages for a year). This volume concludes with claims anyone going 10 k over limits has a higher offense risk rating (4) than someone on the legal alc limit (3) so should be punished the same - jail for example!

WOW - and I find after much digging that their research putting inapt speed as the number 1 factor is both based on estimates (only have known speeds for 50% of fatal crashes) and includes drunks (1/2 of the so called speed dead were drunks)!

Where do MOT scientists and ACC workers get their qualifications. To any sentient being their research is a joke.

**Lou Girardin** · 10th August 2006, 08:39

'Speeding' being too fast for the conditions. (Their definition)
Speed enforcement has no relevance whatsoever in dealing with this problem, unless they make it a capital offense to exceed the safe speed for the slowest corner in NZ.

**Clockwork** · 10th August 2006, 08:45

Their research isn't for sentient beings..... it's for politicians.

**MSTRS:Me** · 10th August 2006, 08:54

At the Hawkes Bay mtg on Tuesday, I proposed doing away with the 'one speed fits all' 100kph with the suggestion including lifting the limit to 120kph on open straight(ish) highways (eg Takapau Plains, Himitangi straights)...this STUPID woman from ACC stated that it wouldn't be safe on roads without a median barrier. WTF??!!
No answer to my response (funny that) which was "If I cross the centreline at 100kph and headon with a vehicle doing the same (combined impact of 200kph), then we are all dead. What's the difference adding 40kph combined?"

**candor** · 10th August 2006, 15:01

Mstrs - I know where her illogic is coming from
The true agenda of the speed BS is to try and psychologically trick everyone to go at 80 without having to unpopularly lower the speed limit. Because a head on at 80 is more survivable than at 100 - you will get one dead driver not 2 if you lucky. I know! Tho the survivor driver will probably be better off dead for all the damage they'll have. Still it trims the toll so looks better on paper when we have to report our figures to the W.H.O. / World Bank.

The clear solution to keep everyone happy is to throw in 200 k of median barriers a year (with rubber protection for bikes) till all main highways done and up the speed limit so we can join the first world. Problem is we're rated by World Bank as second world so undeserving of such safety and efficiency. And that we follow Australias lead in all road safety matters. They aren't doing medians as they have too much remote road thats hard to maintain (unlike us). Still we copy them and deal with things in primitive manner.

**SPman** · 10th August 2006, 15:10

What road safety in Aus. - a big thing over here is the metal strip at the side of country roads - drivers drop a wheel on the gravel (the seal is quite narrow on most roads) and promptly lose control of their vehicles!

We seem to be going back to the official view that the human body will explode if it exceeds the speed of a horse!

**James Deuce** · 10th August 2006, 15:20

Originally Posted by candor

Because a head on at 80 is more survivable than at 100 - you will get one dead driver not 2 if you lucky.

No it's no. It's the same as driving into an immovable object at 160km/hr.

**MSTRS:Me** · 10th August 2006, 15:32

Originally Posted by candor

Mstrs - I know where her illogic is coming from
The true agenda of the speed BS is to try and psychologically trick everyone to go at 80 without having to unpopularly lower the speed limit. Because a head on at 80 is more survivable than at 100 - you will get one dead driver not 2 if you lucky. I know! Tho the survivor driver will probably be better off dead for all the damage they'll have. Still it trims the toll so looks better on paper when we have to report our figures to the W.H.O. / World Bank.

The clear solution to keep everyone happy is to throw in 200 k of median barriers a year (with rubber protection for bikes) till all main highways done and up the speed limit so we can join the first world. Problem is we're rated by World Bank as second world so undeserving of such safety and efficiency. And that we follow Australias lead in all road safety matters. They aren't doing medians as they have too much remote road thats hard to maintain (unlike us). Still we copy them and deal with things in primitive manner.

If you get where she is coming from, then you must be one of the 'chosen few'....Jim2 is right and so am I. I remember the original ads when seatbelts were becoming standard equipment...basically it said that without a seltbelt it takes 5/8th of a second to die at 80kph (flail chest)...that is the same as a headon of 2 vehicles travelling at only 40kph each. And yes, I realise that seatbelts save lives which is a good thing, but this bullshit we are surrounded by....

**Lou Girardin** · 10th August 2006, 15:57

Originally Posted by Jim2

No it's no. It's the same as driving into an immovable object at 160km/hr.

Wouldn't the fact of two cars with crumple zones mitigate the effects of a 160 km/h head on as compared to only one when you hit an immovable object?

**James Deuce** · 10th August 2006, 16:55

Originally Posted by Lou Girardin

Wouldn't the fact of two cars with crumple zones mitigate the effects of a 160 km/h head on as compared to only one when you hit an immovable object?

Not enough to save lives.

There's a fearsome amount of energy generated in a head on collision.

It increases by the square of the velocity too.

I know it's a bogus US legal page but it does explain the physics involved really wel.

http://consumerlawpage.com/article/air-bag-safety.shtml

**sAsLEX** · 10th August 2006, 16:58

Originally Posted by Jim2

It increases by the square of the velocity too.

ssshhhhhh dont let them hear that! they might start to back up some of their wacky claims with science!

**idb** · 10th August 2006, 17:00

Originally Posted by SPman

We seem to be going back to the official view that the human body will explode if it exceeds the speed of a horse!

I have a man walk in front of my bike waving a red flag whenever I go out.

**Lou Girardin** · 10th August 2006, 17:00

I heard of a 200 km/h head-on that both drivers survived. It was an autocide on the Southern M/way some years back. One car was a 240Z, can't remember the other. Luck and the way the cars hit probably had a lot to do with the survival.

**James Deuce** · 10th August 2006, 17:00

Originally Posted by sAsLEX

ssshhhhhh dont let them hear that! they might start to back up some of their wacky claims with science!

Science + Psuedo Science = Public Policy.

Such has it always been.

The simplest way to mitigate the issues above is to limit the opportunity for traffic to meet head on.

**James Deuce** · 10th August 2006, 17:03

Originally Posted by Lou Girardin

I heard of a 200 km/h head-on that both drivers survived. It was an autocide on the Southern M/way some years back. One car was a 240Z, can't remember the other. Luck and the way the cars hit probably had a lot to do with the survival.

There's always exceptions, but the vast majority of head on accidents at motorway speeds mean death for all the occupants involved.