If you live in one of the larger population centers in North America, and maybe elsewhere, you might have noticed drivers seem to be increasingly distracted. Maybe it has something to do with smart phones, touchscreens in cars, substance abuse, or the fact Venus is in retrograde – we don’t know. What we do know is this video of a crash in Iowa perfectly illustrates this point.
Brush up on your driving skills with this helpful video.
The footage was taken back in 2019 on U.S. 20 near Waterloo, Iowa. It’s a point on the highway where it narrows from two lanes going in the same direction to a single lane. Those spots are prone to slowdowns when traffic is busy, as seems to be the case here.
If you travel through the area often, you should already be aware of the normal slowdowns at that point. Maybe the person who caused this accident isn’t familiar with the road. But if that’s the case then the driver had all the more reason to be paying attention. In other words, any way you cut it, short of having a medical emergency, this driver was one hundred percent just not watching the road.
At the start of the short video clip, which we’ve included, you see traffic has come to a complete stop. While all the other cars are slowing down, there’s a pickup truck that just keeps going the same speed, rocketing towards the others.
With no sign of even hitting the brakes at the last split second, the truck just plows into a couple of vehicles stopped behind a semi-truck. Of course, the big rig is pretty much unaffected by the impact, but we can see as it crawls forward what’s left in its wake looks ugly.
But what’s just as disturbing is the fact that other vehicles, including other semis, that are traveling behind the pickup that caused the crash had to visibly slam on their brakes. In other words, they didn’t notice the traffic slowdown until the last moment. It wasn’t just the one driver who was distracted, although the others thankfully paid attention and acted in time to keep this from becoming a much larger accident.
Everyone can debate about why drivers are so distracted these days, but nobody in their right mind can argue it’s not a problem.
Via YouTube/Traffic Cam Watch
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