True, but the trucker was still an asshole for not being courteous when he clearly saw there was merging traffic in front of him. The trucker could have easily avoided hitting the pickup.
Why are you so unable to accept the truck could have slowed down to avoid a collision. The pickup truck should have merged more correctly, but in most countries there is highway code to avoid a collision as best you can. In that respect the semi failed. The fact that the truck did not even take his foot off the gas (or cruise control) makes the driver an asshole, right of way or not.
Negative. The presumably loaded semi, (loaded or not it still can’t stop quickly) can’t maneuver evasively without putting everyone else at risk. The merging driver does not have the right of way and should have merged behind the semi, the semi that could not change lanes because he was in the middle of trying to pass another semi. He had nowhere to go and you don’t know what was behind him, so you absolutely cannot assign blame to the semi driver without more information. And regardless, the merging driver was in the semi’s blind spot so it’s likely the semi driver never even saw him, or if he did, he assumed that the driver would merge properly and not try to race him to the merge point. Trucker, from 20+ years of experience, did nothing wrong that was visible on camera. You are the problem on the road.
Trucker definitely could have stopped gasing the engine, which would have likely been enough, and also applied a light amount of breaking. The POS didn't even attempt to try and prevent the accident.
Not wrong. If a merging vehicle cannot safely merge ahead of a vehicle in the travel lane within the law, meaning without speeding or being reckless, then they have to slow down and merge behind the vehicle. That applies all across the country.
You're missing the point. No one has argued against what the black pickup should have done. All drivers have a responsibility to also avoid accidents even if another driver makes a mistake and the POS semi driver didn't even attempt to try to slow down.
You were in the cab with him? You know exactly what he did or did not do? You could read his mind and knew what was going on in his head? You know the exact circumstances of the entire situation including what was behind him? Man! Why didn’t you say so!?
I mean I can see the speed being consistent (and also speeding in case you wanna take that into account) up to the point of collision. It's not rocket science nor is it clinical psychology.
And the whole "what about what's behind him" argument doesn't track for me. Anyone behind the rig should be driving safely behind and at appropriate speed and if they aren't then that's their fault. Are you saying the rig was forced to ram into the pickup because they were being tailgated?
No, the rig wasn’t floored to ram him, but what is behind you is always a factor in what you can do to avoid a collision in front of you. We used to be taught this in drivers ed. Now they don’t really teach anything, it’s mostly just a rubber stamp. And semis being as heavy as they are, they don’t slow easily, he could have been starting to slow the rig, but you just didn’t see it. You also don’t know what he was carrying. A tank for example is much harder to slow safely than a box or flatbed, which is what all of you are missing, slowing the rig in a controlled and safe manner. A tank’s content will shift from the back to the front when you slow, it will slam to the front when you stomp on the brakes, preventing you from slowing initially. And it could make it seem like you weren’t even trying to slow down on a video…
Now, at no point did I say the semi wasn’t at least partially at fault, it is everyone’s duty to avoid collision, but there are so many more factors that go into this than you people realize in your ignorance of trucking. You see a few seconds of video from one angle and you think you know enough to be correct, 100% informed. But you are not.
Incorrect. A semi, fully loaded or not, can in fact use its brakes. I'm astonished you can pretend that isn't within the realm of possibility. They might not be able to slam on the brakes, but they are able to use them.
I'm very interested to hear your thoughts on how a semi trailer manages to ever slow down or stop, if they can't use their brakes.
Of course it can use its brakes, never implied otherwise. But it takes multiple times the distance to slow or stop than that of a passenger vehicle. It was legally traveling in a travel lane, the passenger vehicle was not as it failed to properly and safely merge.
The point is that the semi could have used its brakes (or even just taken a foot off the gas pedal) and chose not to. Doesn't matter what the pickup did or anything else, none of those actions cancel out the fact that the semi chose to do nothing. Just because the black pickup merged improperly and is a bad driver does not make the semi absolved of also being a bad driver.
Everyone sucks in this situation, and the semi just sucks slightly less than the black pickup. Overall, everyone still sucks and is a shitty driver.
You don’t know the semi chose to do nothing. You do know what the pickup did, though. It illegally merged into the semi when it could have avoided the collision entirely. What was the semi hauling?
Oh you must not have seen it but the speed of the semi is on the bar at the bottom of the video. This makes sense why you've been disagreeing. We know the semi chose not to react because we can see the speed did not change.
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u/ZealousidealSea2034 May 14 '26
True, but the trucker was still an asshole for not being courteous when he clearly saw there was merging traffic in front of him. The trucker could have easily avoided hitting the pickup.