Where do you turn if you’ve had an accident you didn’t like? Accident Exchange, of course. Maybe they can sort you out with a different accident – perhaps one that will work out better for you. And by the sound of it they’re going to be exceedingly busy doing exactly that this month.
October, they reckon (it says so in their press release), is the accidentiest time of year due to the sudden onset of inclement weather. RTAs can be expected to increase by 15% this month (compared with the previous six) because motorists still think it’s summer, when of course it isn’t.
RTAs, incidentally – and some Bankstone News readers may already know this – are Road Traffic Accidents, not to be confused with the more trivial CTAs (Canal Traffic Accidents), the distinctly more sinister DTAs (Drug Traffic Accidents), and of course ATAs (members of the American Tinnitus Association).
Anyway, back to the story, such as it is: one minute the nation’s motorists are blithely coasting along, gangster-leaning with the top down, picnic hamper in the back, when – quite literally out of nowhere – there’s rain, leaves (wrong kind, obviously), grease, mud and kinds of other autumnal crud too multifarious to mention all over the shop, and they’re skidding out of control with a one-way ticket to the ditch.
“Stopping distances on wet and slippery roads can double those of dry conditions,” AE claims, and Bankstone News is willing to bet they do. “A vehicle travelling at 40mph will need up to 72 metres to come to a stop,” they add. Unless of course there’s a tree, a lamppost, or a rather lovely dry stone wall in the way.
When people today are not offering or ensuring, they are often to be found delivering. The months of the year are no different, it seems:
“October delivers some of the worst driving conditions of the year as the weather changes and the clocks go back, but drivers continue as if they were in the summer months,” complains AE’s sturdily-monickered Gordon Grant.
Gordon fears drivers are losing their grip on reality, admonishing: “Motorists need to remember the basic laws of physics and common sense when the conditions under tyre change.”
A timely reminder, if ever Bankstone News heard one.
How do they do that?
No responses yet