Caravan accident on the A90 nr Dundee

[Chrisjkerr]

Anyone else seen this on various news and video sharing websites? I'd be gutted if that was mine! I hope the occupants are ok and the insurance is covering this?

I know we can't accurately judge his/her speed in the video but it looks to me to be much quicker than the HGV they're overtaking. It could be that the HGV isn't at his maximum speed limit.

The van looks like it was a 2012 Sterling Moonstone rated at a possible 1615kg MTPLM and a VW Passat Saloon, max tow potentially 1800kg with a minimum car unladen weight of 1648kg. We can only speculate on his loading of car and caravan but I would have said that combination should have been a sound match if loaded correctly?

Makes you realise how quickly these things can happen when towing!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtZqG1c6UGE
Sorry, any admins able to move this to the General area. Somehow it's posted to the New Member board.

 

[WoodlandsCamper]

The van looks like it was a 2012 Sterling Moonstone rated at a possible 1615kg MTPLM and a VW Passat Saloon, max tow potentially 1800kg with a minimum car unladen weight of 1648kg. We can only speculate on his loading of car and caravan but I would have said that combination should have been a sound match if loaded correctly?

Not too sure about a 'sound match', given the figures you quoted the ratio is about 98%. Forget the 'max tow 1800kg' when talking about caravans.

 

[Thingy]

Looks like he may have been caught by a cross wind. I thought at first the tress werent moving, but the last few seconds show otherwise.

 

[ProfJohnL]

I think we can get an estimate of the outfit's speed. Based on the video evidence and the time it takes for the car to cover a number of lane markings, I estimate the car was traveling 70mph or more!

If you are interested in how I derive that figure read on:

There are lots of clues in the video which can be used to estimate the vehicle speeds. Principally the vehicles passing of the white lines, which because it's as dual carriage way with a speed limit in excess of 40mph, the white lines have to conform to 1005.1 in

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/223667/traffic-signs-manual-chapter-05.pdf
The space between the lane dashes is 7M and the line itself is 2M giving an repeat interval of 9M.

At the outset of the video, the lorry covers 3 dashes and two gaps in a second which repeats per second or 22m this equates to about 50mph with a margin of error of about +/-10%.

Using the Dashcam's clock, it changes to 29 seconds with the lorry having 5 clear dashes to the Dundee 5 sign. From this point lorry moves one gap and dash (9M) before the shadow of the car becomes apparent roughly 4 dashes and half a gap to the sign. Importantly this means roughly 1/3 of the 29th second has already passed.

As there are at least 4 clear dashes between the car and the road sign, that is a distance of 4x2 + 3x7 = 29M. When the car has drawn level with the sign, the dashcam clock is still showing 29 seconds. That means the car has traveled is about 27M in 2/3 of a second. That means the car would be covering roughly 40m/s or 89mph! These are estimates and even allowing for a 10% margin of error that suggests the car was traveling in excess of 70mph, which is consistent with the images the video produces.

Ironically just before the Petterden junction there is an older style Gatso speed camera. I wonder if it caught anything?

 

[Chrisjkerr]

Nice one Prof. I was expecting you to have replied. Great observations. I wonder if the police would have been interested in the video and came to a similar conclusion? I'm guessing they'd have access to the cars ECU showing the speed once the trailer stability protection kicked in or once the driver hit the breaks?

 

[Raywood]

Looks like excessive speed to me and possibly pulling in too quickly after overtaking. If Chrisjkerr is right the towing ratio is far too high at near 100% and it would definitely require more care then shown.