May 23 2009
With four wheels comes great responsibility
Want to feel like Spiderman? Go drive a car.
No, I’m serious.
We often forget that being able to drive a car is both a privilege and a responsibility – when you start the engine, two tonnes of potentially lethal automobile are at your disposal, to be placed in a certain condition, time and place solely at the driver’s discretion.
Why bring this up? A recent accident in Loyang claimed the lives of three people, when the Subaru in question lost control at what was undoubtedly high speed, then embedded a tree into itself and caught fire.
Also fresh on my mind are two other high-profile accidents last year: one on Old Upper Thomson Road where two polytechnic students were killed in a Mitsubishi Lancer, and another Subaru in Geylang which split into two.
Speed was probably the main factor in these accidents, judging by the damage, although other causes like driver fatigue can’t be ruled out. The two in the Lancer weren’t wearing seatbelts either.
Speed alone is neither fatal, nor dangerous – It’s the context which makes it so. With F1 drivers for instance, speed is their daily bread, yet the last F1 fatality was Senna 15 years ago.
When you speed up, everything occurs faster and reaction time is reduced. The behaviour of the vehicle changes, no matter what you’re driving. If you’re not experienced (and sometimes even if you are), adrenaline makes it hard to react in accordance with the laws of physics over raw instinct.
Consider two cases:
1. A well-rested highly experienced driver, a modern car with a high level of safety equipment, perfect daytime weather and a familiar German Autobahn.
2. A freshly-minted licensee, a car with a less than stellar NCAP rating, midnight, an infamous winding road in an area inhabited by wild animals, vegetation on the tarmac and four occupants without safety belts on.
There’s a tiny difference between being a driving enthusiast and a reckless killer: It’s what you consider before stepping on the gas.
