But I only looked at it for a moment ...

[Clitheroekid]

... and the horrendous consequences for so many people - a very thought-provoking and moving film - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UztJcUjGXbY

[Lootman]

Agreed but I am not convinced that custodial sentences are an effective remedy for negligence.

If I am thinking of a deliberate act like robbing a bank then prison is a deterrence.

But nobody intends to be involved in a traffic accident and so the deterrence factor seems to miss the point somehow.

[DrFfybes]

Perhaps the deterrent needs to be stronger.

It is a conscious decision to use a phone and drive, just as it is a conscious decision to drink and drive. So, automatic 12 month ban for anyone caught using a phone, and have patrols out there checking more often.

And anyone causing an accident through using their phone spends one hour in prison for each hour that each motorist is delayed through their actions (and with 3-4000 vehicles per hour on a busy motorway, that can soon add up), plus a year for each person injured, and a decade for each death they cause.

Paul

[Lootman]

Perhaps the deterrent needs to be stronger.

It is a conscious decision to use a phone and drive, just as it is a conscious decision to drink and drive. So, automatic 12 month ban for anyone caught using a phone, and have patrols out there checking more often.

Yes but the unintended consequence of punitive drink-drive penalties is that it increases the risk of drivers leaving the scene of the accident if they have had one too many.

[DrFfybes]

Perhaps the deterrent needs to be stronger.

It is a conscious decision to use a phone and drive, just as it is a conscious decision to drink and drive. So, automatic 12 month ban for anyone caught using a phone, and have patrols out there checking more often.

Yes but the unintended consequence of punitive drink-drive penalties is that it increases the risk of drivers leaving the scene of the accident if they have had one too many.

I'd have thought the sort of person who'd do a runner after an accident would do so irrespective of their alcohol consumption. Where did you see this observation reported?

[Lootman]

Perhaps the deterrent needs to be stronger.

It is a conscious decision to use a phone and drive, just as it is a conscious decision to drink and drive. So, automatic 12 month ban for anyone caught using a phone, and have patrols out there checking more often.

Yes but the unintended consequence of punitive drink-drive penalties is that it increases the risk of drivers leaving the scene of the accident if they have had one too many.

I'd have thought the sort of person who'd do a runner after an accident would do so irrespective of their alcohol consumption. Where did you see this observation reported?

I am reporting this observation. Decades ago, in my wanton youth, I drove after a few drinks and had a minor fender-bender with another vehicle in Bayswater. We got out and discussed the minor damage. All was fine and we were about to exchange information when the other driver indicated that he was going to call the cops. There was no reason to because there was no injury.

So instead I drove off and that was the end of the matter. By escalating un-necessarily he squandered his claim. I find it hard to believe that I am the only person in the history of humanity who had the same thought.

Not proud of it but the point I am making is that if you make drunk-driving or phone-driving penalties more punitive then drivers may be more likely to take the risk of leaving the scene.

[Mike4]

I found the video deeply irritating. After six or seven minutes of hand-wringing and 'aint it awful' stuff I found myself just skipping forward to random points to try to find out what actually happened. I never did find out, other than I suspect the lorry driver drove into the back of stationary traffic because he wasn't looking where he was going. I think he was probably looking at his phone but I'm only surmising this from the comments under the video and comments on here.

Is that about right?

[bungeejumper]

I never did find out, other than I suspect the lorry driver drove into the back of stationary traffic because he wasn't looking where he was going. I think he was probably looking at his phone but I'm only surmising this from the comments under the video and comments on here.

I haven't watched the film either, but from memory he'd been on a dating app for ages and had made (ten?) contacts already during that journey. Not looking where he was going was an established pattern, not the result of a momentary distraction.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tyne-62235941

BJ

[Mike4]

I never did find out, other than I suspect the lorry driver drove into the back of stationary traffic because he wasn't looking where he was going. I think he was probably looking at his phone but I'm only surmising this from the comments under the video and comments on here.

I haven't watched the film either, but from memory he'd been on a dating app for ages and had made (ten?) contacts already during that journey. Not looking where he was going was an established pattern, not the result of a momentary distraction.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tyne-62235941

BJ

Thanks. Whenever there is an accident (anything from multiple fatalities down to someone damaging their finger) I feel a burning need to figure out the details of how it came to happen, probably so I can try to avoid it happening to me. I think I maintain a mental repertoire or library of "Things That Can Go Wrong And Hurt Us" and I find deeply disturbing any accident where details of what led up to it are being withheld or not explained. Your BBC link is far more illuminating and although it still seems to go out of its way to shock, it does give some specific details which I find reassuring to know, even though grim.

In my own line of work there are typically two or three serious gas explosions a year destroying whole houses, and many CO fatalities. The HSE investigates them all looking for prosecutions but it never publishes details of its findings AFAIK, which find deeply frustrating because no-one gets the opportunity to understand exactly how events unfolded and consequently learn from them.

(Spelling edit.)

[9873210]

Perhaps the deterrent needs to be stronger.

It is a conscious decision to use a phone and drive, just as it is a conscious decision to drink and drive. So, automatic 12 month ban for anyone caught using a phone, and have patrols out there checking more often.

Deterrence depends far more on the likelihood of being caught than the severity of the penalty. If offenders cared about a small chance of a really bad outcome existing practice, or the laws of physics, would be enough. Higher penalties may be justified, but not on pragmatic grounds of reducing harm. We need more enforcement, as long as they are not looking only for people texting while driving while black.

And anyone causing an accident through using their phone spends one hour in prison for each hour that each motorist is delayed through their actions (and with 3-4000 vehicles per hour on a busy motorway, that can soon add up), plus a year for each person injured, and a decade for each death they cause.

It's not an accident, it's a crash. As you said they made a decision, and it had consequences.

[Lootman]

Perhaps the deterrent needs to be stronger.

It is a conscious decision to use a phone and drive, just as it is a conscious decision to drink and drive. So, automatic 12 month ban for anyone caught using a phone, and have patrols out there checking more often.

Deterrence depends far more on the likelihood of being caught than the severity of the penalty. If offenders cared about a small chance of a really bad outcome existing practice, or the laws of physics, would be enough. Higher penalties may be justified, but not on pragmatic grounds of reducing harm. We need more enforcement, as long as they are not looking only for people texting while driving while black.

But the problem with making a punishment disproportionately harsh is what I noted before. It can increase the motivation to leave the scene of an accident rather than doing the right thing which is to stop, report the incident, try and help, co-operate with authorities etc. The law of unintended consequences.

And anyone causing an accident through using their phone spends one hour in prison for each hour that each motorist is delayed through their actions (and with 3-4000 vehicles per hour on a busy motorway, that can soon add up), plus a year for each person injured, and a decade for each death they cause.

It's not an accident, it's a crash.

It is both a crash and an accident, unless it was intended of course, as in a road rage incident or vehicular homicide.

[Clitheroekid]

Agreed but I am not convinced that custodial sentences are an effective remedy for negligence.

If I am thinking of a deliberate act like robbing a bank then prison is a deterrence.

But nobody intends to be involved in a traffic accident and so the deterrence factor seems to miss the point somehow.

In principle I agree 100%. Over the years I've been involved in several cases where someone was killed or severely injured as a result of an accident caused by the driver being momentarily distracted. Often, this was something as mundane as switching radio channels / changing a CD / inputting information into a satnav, or even, on one occasion (which fortunately didn't result in serious injury) staring at a girl in an extremely revealing dress!

In all such serious cases the driver has been completely devastated by the consequences of their (admitted) carelessness. Any punishment given by a court is as nothing compared to the self-imposed sentence of a guilty conscience, and this is nearly always reflected in non-custodial sentences being passed.

However, there's a huge difference between carelessness and recklessness. It's one thing to take your eyes off the road for a couple of seconds to change a CD, but it's something else entirely when you're driving at speed (particularly in a 38 ton truck) sending and receiving text messages or looking at dating sites. That's the equivalent of driving with your eyes closed for a bet or driving while extremely drunk.

It's a deliberate decision to take a risk with other people's lives, and a severe prison sentence has to be imposed not necessarily as a deterrent to others (who are often too stupid to consider the risk) but simply as a punishment to reflect how strongly the rest of us feel about such behaviour.

[Mike4]

It's not an accident, it's a crash. As you said they made a decision, and it had consequences.

I agree. It appears to have happened because as BJ suggests and so does the BBC report, he was routinely and repeatedly using his phone for long periods typing in messages on Tinder. It said in the BBC report he'd racked up a bill of £50 for messaging women on Tinder during just that trip!

So I'm not buying the accident happening like the thread title says. His phone appears to have been in use MUCH more than "I just looked at it for a moment" and the outcome that occurred was inevitable eventually, IMO.

[Lootman]

It's not an accident, it's a crash. As you said they made a decision, and it had consequences.

I agree. It appears to have happened because as BJ suggests and so does the BBC report, he was routinely and repeatedly using his phone for long periods typing in messages on Tinder. It said in the BBC report he'd racked up a bill of £50 for messaging women on Tinder during just that trip!

So I'm not buying the accident happening like the thread title says. His phone appears to have been in use MUCH more than "I just looked at it for a moment" and the outcome that occurred was inevitable eventually, IMO.

But I think when most people use the word "accident" they simply mean that the resultant crash was not intended. Nobody gets into a car with the idea of hitting another vehicle.

Some people do not like to use the word "accident" because they think it implies that means no blame or fault. But that is not the case at all - you can be involved in an accident where you are fully to blame for it because of negligence, recklessness etc. People go to prison for that in some cases.

The opposite of "accident" is "deliberate" or "intentional".

The opposite of "at fault" is "not at fault" or "blameless".

Two different things.

[Dod101]

Well we are all different. What I took from it was the dedication of the emergency services. Would you like to have been the police, or firemen or medics in that sort of situation? And it was not an accident like a burst tyre or something. It was as good as deliberately driving into a line of stationary vehicles. Yes the police are useless until we need them and did you notice that it was the Durham police?

The guy should have got ten years not three.

Dod

[Dod101]

Agreed but I am not convinced that custodial sentences are an effective remedy for negligence.

If I am thinking of a deliberate act like robbing a bank then prison is a deterrence.

But nobody intends to be involved in a traffic accident and so the deterrence factor seems to miss the point somehow.

As I think may have been said later in the thread, I do not think that the custodial sentence is intended as a deterrence in this case, it is the cost that society requires of someone who causes such terrible damage to people's lives. Someone caught using a mobile phone whilst driving (or these days whilst in charge of a vehicle) gets a fine and points on the licence as a deterrent, but after an occurrence as in the film , the sentence is not intended as a deterrent; a bit late for that, but as a form of punishment or retribution demanded by society.

Dod

[Mike4]

Agreed but I am not convinced that custodial sentences are an effective remedy for negligence.

If I am thinking of a deliberate act like robbing a bank then prison is a deterrence.

But nobody intends to be involved in a traffic accident and so the deterrence factor seems to miss the point somehow.

As I think may have been said later in the thread, I do not think that the custodial sentence is intended as a deterrence in this case, it is the cost that society requires of someone who causes such terrible damage to people's lives. Someone caught using a mobile phone whilst driving (or these days whilst in charge of a vehicle) gets a fine and points on the licence as a deterrent, but after an occurrence as in the film , the sentence is not intended as a deterrent; a bit late for that, but as a form of punishment or retribution demanded by society.

Dod

But... but...

It was so much more than just "using a mobile phone", which is most unusual and the consequences were far worse than most people using their mobiles at the wheel.

I drive perhaps 500 motorway miles a week and I'd say perhaps 20% of the slower moving vehicles I pass are using their mobiles if I look. That makes millions of cases a day across the UK of motorists using their mobiles which although bad, results in few or no adverse consequences. The degree of carnage in this case suggests something out of the ordinary happened to initiate it. That 'something' appears to have been the bloke composing text messages on his mobile whilst driving, loads of them routinely and all the time, not just glancing at it to see who just called.

[Dod101]

Agreed but I am not convinced that custodial sentences are an effective remedy for negligence.

If I am thinking of a deliberate act like robbing a bank then prison is a deterrence.

But nobody intends to be involved in a traffic accident and so the deterrence factor seems to miss the point somehow.

As I think may have been said later in the thread, I do not think that the custodial sentence is intended as a deterrence in this case, it is the cost that society requires of someone who causes such terrible damage to people's lives. Someone caught using a mobile phone whilst driving (or these days whilst in charge of a vehicle) gets a fine and points on the licence as a deterrent, but after an occurrence as in the film , the sentence is not intended as a deterrent; a bit late for that, but as a form of punishment or retribution demanded by society.

Dod

But... but...

It was so much more than just "using a mobile phone", which is most unusual and the consequences were far worse than most people using their mobiles at the wheel.

I drive perhaps 500 motorway miles a week and I'd say perhaps 20% of the slower moving vehicles I pass are using their mobiles if I look. That makes millions of cases a day across the UK of motorists using their mobiles which although bad, results in few or no adverse consequences. The degree of carnage in this case suggests something out of the ordinary happened to initiate it. That 'something' appears to have been the bloke composing text messages on his mobile whilst driving, loads of them routinely and all the time, not just glancing at it to see who just called.

If your number of 20% is anything like correct that is shocking and suggests that the so called deterrent is not working. This case is just an extension of that and shows what can happen if you are driving a large and heavy truck and do not look where you are going. Whether he is using his phone once or many times really to me makes no difference. We all glance away from the road from time to time and even answering a 'no hands' call usually means glancing to make sure you press the correct button. This was much more than that obviously but a truck moving at 50/60 mph with the driver concentrating on his mobile only needs to go wrong once. I guess the extent of the damage was because the driver made no attempt to stop but ploughed into the vehicles at more or less full tilt.

We all forget just how lethal a modern car is when being driven at 60/70 mph because of the fact that it is almost effortless to drive and we are sitting in a comfortable quiet cabin either with aircon or heater to get the optimum temperature. I am sure that applies to a modern truck just as much as to a car but, as we can see, the consequences are usually much worse because of the additional weight.

Dod

[pje16]

This is one reasons why I couldn't be a policeman
they take a lot of stick from some people but do not deserve that
HOW can you turn up to something like that and switch when you go home
The same applies to the firecrew and ambulance team
What a very sad incident

[pje16]

We all forget just how lethal a modern car is when being driven at 60/70 mph because of the fact that it is almost effortless to drive and we are sitting in a comfortable quiet cabin either with aircon or heater to get the optimum temperature.
Dod

How very true
When I was a kid I always remember my mum saying when you are behind the wheel of car, it is the only time you are likely to kill someone