Nice HGV driver - doesn't see car.

[dondare]

Too many dozy car drivers, more like.
One incident doesn't make every lorry ever unsafe: while I acknowledge that the blind spots on a DAF 95 are not ideal, I drove one all over the UK for eight months and had only one near miss, on a roundabout in Aberdeen, when a car pulled onto the roundabout next to my cab and nearly got taken out when I went to pull off the roundabout at the next exit.

Dozy drivers on motorways and inexperienced female cyclists in towns are part of the road environment. Lorries pose a hazard in the way that other large vehicles such as buses and coaches, which have much better visibility from the cab, do not. A vehicle which is only safe if everyone else keeps well out of it's way is not safe.

 

[Rhythm Thief]

Dozy drivers on motorways and inexperienced female cyclists in towns are part of the road environment. Lorries pose a hazard in the way that other large vehicles such as buses and coaches, which have much better visibility from the cab, do not. A vehicle which is only safe if everyone else keeps well out of it's way is not safe.

That's a fair point, but my point was that these things are safe very nearly all the time. And no vehicle, no matter how few blind spots it has, is always safe in every circumstance; the question is not "are artics safe?", but "are artics safer than ten 7.5 tonne vehicles?". DAF 95s are not made any more, and as I said earlier, the problem of the front blind spot has been addressed on more modern trucks by the fitment of a covvex mirror above the windscreen.
It's just occurred to me that you could very easily turn your argument around and say that because the driver of the Clio didn't see the tuck in her mirror before pulling out and clipping its front bumper, Renault Clios are also not safe.

 

[KEEF]

Two years ago one of my drivers overtook a car on the M1 and after checking all his mirrors could not see the car anywhere and presumed the car had left the Motorway at the last slip road so moved over into the nearside lane. The car which was keeping pace with him in his blind spot was caught by his truck and was flipped round to the front of the truck.The truck driver caught sight of the car as it moved out of his blind spot and stopped.So it can happen.

 

[Rhythm Thief]

Two years ago one of my drivers overtook a car on the M1 and after checking all his mirrors could not see the car anywhere and presumed the car had left the Motorway at the last slip road so moved over into the nearside lane. The car which was keeping pace with him in his blind spot was caught by his truck and was flipped round to the front of the truck.The truck driver caught sight of the car as it moved out of his blind spot and stopped.So it can happen.

That's what I would have thought happened in this case. A surprising number of car drivers seem perfectly content to join the motorway next to a truck and then sit there at the same pace as it for miles. This is one reason I don't bother moving over to let people on to the motorway any more: I don't mind whether people go in front of me or behind me, but I don't want them leaving me hung out to dry in the middle lane. Although putting the left hand indicator on usually gets them out of the way.

 

[Riding in Circles]

You should not expect too much from truck drivers, there is a reason they do what they do, eating yorkies all day, rather than having a job that requires a brain.

 

[Crankarm]

You should not expect too much from truck drivers, there is a reason they do what they do, eating yorkies all day, rather than having a job that requires a brain.

Oooo!!! Lee is not gonna like these remarks .........

 

[Rhythm Thief]

You should not expect too much from truck drivers, there is a reason they do what they do, eating yorkies all day, rather than having a job that requires a brain.

It's fun and it's easy, that's why. Which is more than you can say about a lot of jobs. In fact, it's the very fact that I can pretty much switch my brain off to do my job that appeals, thereby saving it for more important things like listening to Radio 4 all night.

 

[Crankarm]

It's fun and it's easy, that's why. Which is more than you can say about a lot of jobs. In fact, it's the very fact that I can pretty much switch my brain off to do my job that appeals, thereby saving it for more important things like listening to Radio 4 all night.

ROFL

You need a brain for this ?

 

[dodgy]

You should not expect too much from truck drivers, there is a reason they do what they do, eating yorkies all day, rather than having a job that requires a brain.

It's funny, I didn't get this impression of you when I spoke to you on the phone a couple of years or so ago.

 

[Rhythm Thief]

ROFL

You need a brain for this ?

Depends. Certainly more of one than you need for Radio 2.

 

[KEEF]

You should not expect too much from truck drivers, there is a reason they do what they do, eating yorkies all day, rather than having a job that requires a brain.

Yeah Yeah

 

[trustysteed]

You should not expect too much from truck drivers, there is a reason they do what they do, eating yorkies all day, rather than having a job that requires a brain.

they eat dogs!?

 

[dondare]

It's just occurred to me that you could very easily turn your argument around and say that because the driver of the Clio didn't see the tuck in her mirror before pulling out and clipping its front bumper, Renault Clios are also not safe.

If Clios had blind spots equivalent to a DAF, they'd be less of a hazard because the driver would feel the bump and know that they'd hit something. Lorries combine every bad feature in a single vehicle.

 

[adds21]

while I acknowledge that the blind spots on a DAF 95 are not ideal, I drove one all over the UK for eight months and had only one near miss

I'm not being funny, but surely you don't necessary know how many near misses you had. It's obvious the driver of the truck in the video wasn't aware he'd hit the car (or the car had hit him / whatever), so presumably if the car missed by a few inches, he may still be unaware of how close it was.

This certainly isn't directed solely at truck drivers BTW, I often think the same when cyclists / car drivers / whoever say they've had "x" near misses. It's always the ones we're not aware of which catch us out.

 

[Riding in Circles]

I knew you couldn't resist that stinky bait Lee.