A 77-year-old woman driving a Ford Ka then failed to see the van in time and hit it, causing the van to crush Mr Jacobs against the safety barrier.
The woman driving the other vehicles husband also died following the crash. Apparently video footage showed her driving very close to the rumble strips on the left side, and the van was only 65cm into the lane after he had pulled to the side. She made no attempt to change lanes, move or slow down according to video footage.
This sounds like it will be controversial for both opponents of smart motorways and also people who want OAP’s tested more regularly. The 77 year old woman sounds very much like she shouldn’t have been driving.
Doesn’t really sound like the smart motorway was at fault here, if someone is paying that little attention while driving they are going to kill someone eventually.
As always, the effort people will go to to avoid blaming drivers staggers belief.
Slamming into stationary objects is not the fault of the smart motorway, but on the other hand, if the quality of drivers is so low, maybe they should pause then.
Yes of course it’s the responsibility of drivers to pay attention and anticipate breakdowns like this. Yes, they’re responsible if they cause a collision like this. No, it isn’t “the fault” of the smart motorway. But that’s all irrelevant really. The ultimate aim is to have a safe road system for all, where the frequency of collisions like this is minimised, or even eliminated. And the best way to do this is to separate broken down vehicles from moving vehicles. Which is why hard shoulders are a good idea.
You can argue against this, but would you also argue for the removal of all pedestrian footways, preferring instead to walk in the carriageway, mixing with traffic? No, of course not.
This is why you get out of the vehicle and stand behind the crash barriers if you have to stop like this. There’s always going to be some idiot that isn’t looking at the road in front of them driving on your road eventually. Even on a proper hard shoulder you’re not safe at all.
Horrible situation all round.
Traffic was horrendous yesterday we were on the m25 and M4 the smart motorway bits did not seem to help any imo
However I have always been advised, if you break down on a motorway, get out of your car and stand behind the safety barrier.
The number of AA/RAC people who have been killed on the hard shoulder with a van with flashing lights is enough that there is a memorial wall in most of the buildings
Smart motorways should be made illegal. As should these new yellow lamppost average speed checks, whereby drivers will just frantically ‘jam on’ when they suddenly realise they haven’t been paying full attention.
Both creating accidents just WAITING to happen.
Bit of a tangent but you can’t trust drivers with shit – smart motorway or not they still act almost entirely within their own interests.
I’ve seen it multiple times now where a motorway is slowed due to an accident – and half the cars still shoot through, using the closed lane, overtaking, undertaking, travelling twice the posted speed limit.
This not only makes it dangerous for the broken down cars but also everyone else that is following the law, you end up with traffic moving at dangerously different speeds.
The inconvenience of driving at 40mph for 500 yards is too much for most people, people are awful.
Why do they design such a lane? Don’t they have certain safety standards for emergency lanes?
Motorways were safer without the smart motorway, people now pick a Lane and sit on it which is much more dangerous, people are bored when driving
Almost had a lorry crash into the back of me on a smart motorway. A caravan pulled into my braking space so I had to either swerve left into the barrier, hit the caravan, or take my chances moving into the right lane. My brain made me swerve right, luckily the lorry saw me and stopped. Wouldn’t have happened with a hard shoulder. Now I shit myself every time I’m on a smart motorway.
I had plenty of braking room in front of me as traffic was slowing, the moron towing the caravan decided it was for him to pull into to take the exit. Bastard almost killed me.
It sounds like this happened due to negligence/inability of the 77-year old driver than due to the smart motoryway system. She sounds like an accident waiting to happen.
Smart motorways are one of the dumbest things going which are made all the dumber by some clinically dumb drivers who use them (as per the driver who caused the death who can’t accept blame).
They really are only as *smart* as the people that use them, and not all drivers are *smart*. The M20 is a menace in Kent, and the M1 has had a bit of a reputation for some time now for being unhelpful with its signage in that it unreliably changes between lane open and lane closed, that people take that risk or don’t even know it until it’s too late.
All this could have potentially been avoided if hard-shoulders, which were always reliably useful, were kept separate and open rather than absorbed into the road for the sake of an extra lane. It’s not like drivers know how to use the left-most lane on a motorway anyway, the penultimate right-hand lane is the people’s choice of lane going by experience.
This was a tragic accident by design. It does not excuse the dangerousness of the lady driving but things could have been done to reduce those chances.
I still don’t really understand the benefit of smart motorways.
Whenever the left lane closes, traffic snarls up as a) 4 lanes of traffic now suddenly needs to compact into 3, and b) everyone gawps at the poor sod who caused a lane to close and the speed limit to drop to 50.
No one gawps at a broken down vehicle on the hard shoulder, and the speed limit stays at 70.
>Statements from some of them were read as evidence at the inquest. Some of the witnesses said Mrs Scripps described the van braking suddenly in front of her – despite the van having been stationary.
So he depth perception is what caused this. She didn’t realise the van wasn’t moving.
This is pretty heartbreaking all round but if we can agree on one thing it’s that Mrs Scripps should never drive again.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. When you get to 70 you should have to do a ‘safe to drive’ test which includes an eye sight test.
If someone doesn’t pass they should be given some form of a bus pass. Or even ban them from motorways or roads above 50mph. I see so so many elderly drivers on the road which shouldn’t be driving.
“Smart” motorways with dumb drivers.
Seriously, the average driver is a distracted moron, the amount of people who look like they’re driving drunk, can’t stay in their lane, driving like they’re the only person on the road etc.
You simply cannot expect these kind of drivers to not crash when something goes wrong like a car breaking down with nowhere to go.
Stop smart motorways and bring back hard shoulders FFS. Finally accept you need to be smarter about how you handle traffic, not the “add another lane” nonsense which LA, USA proves with its 20 lane gridlocked highways.
This is why I will never drive in the far left lane on a smart motorway, even if the signs show theyre clear and theres no traffic. Fuck that. Also if you do break down on these motorways, get over the barrier, up the embankment and be atleast 20 metres behind and past your vehicle.
These smart motorways are so badly designed and thought out. The junction nearest to me (M4 slough has the smallest slip road possible, no more than 100m. In that time you’ve got to get up to speed and find a gap. If you’re unlucky enough to get there when two lorries are passing by close together then you’re fucked. It’s only a matter of time before there’s a massive accident.
At least previously you could bail into the hard shoulder if a gap doesn’t appear. But now it’s just a crash barrier. Every time I enter the motorway it feels like I’m rolling the dice
Smart Motorways have to be the dumbest thing named “smart” in a long time.
What are you actually supposed to do if you break down and need to pull over on the motorway without a hard shoulder?
How about stopping old people from driving instead of reinstating hard shoulders? She was clearly not in the correct lane position if she collided with the van looking at the pictures.
It was an unfortunate place to stop the van. Only about 50 metres prior there’s no barrier at all and they could have pulled over onto the grass verge. Another 150 metres of so and the barrier ends and the grass verge is accessible again. In half a mile there an emergency refuge area.
Why are people that old driving in the first place. Over 70s should be barred from driving, or at least be forced to have a driving test every couple of years
And she will suffer fuck all consequences for this as drivera are never ever held accountable properly for their actions…if you want someone dead use a car as you won’t see inside of a cell and things will be spun so your victim takes all the blame
5 seconds to react on a motorway, seriously that’s time to make a cup of tea, do some plastering, pack up every belonging in the house, and still have time to throw up a decent brick wall.
Ridiculous statement by the so called officer, as anyone who travels the motorway network knows.
I’m a mobile worker, and these things are utterly lethal, as the average drover pays very little attention to what is happening around them, or sits on the phone texting.
Unless the majority of drivers are going to get personality/IQ transplants, then safety needs to be designed in.
I’m absolutely livid that the government continues to defend smart motorways despite the clear danger they pose to drivers. This poor man’s death could have been prevented if there had been a hard shoulder available. When will the government listen to the concerns of drivers?
There needs to be more stringent tests on elderly people. Currently all they have to do is get a doctors signature saying they are fit to drive; even though the doctor has no idea what their reactions or awareness/perception is like.
I was in the car with an 80yr old family member recently and he went straight over a zebra crossing. As we approached it, a young woman with a pram started crossing the road. But my family member didn’t slow down. He flew right past her. I yelled at him, told him he almost killed a baby, and he told me most assuredly that there can’t have been anyone there because if there had been, he’d have seen them, and so I must have made it up.
The “smart” M4 between London and Reading scares the shite out of me. As much as I will always keep left, not on that stretch. We need a serious rethink.
We need to make it illegal to go in any red cross lane, proper camera enforcement. Plus massive awareness and fines.
Only use the extra lane when there is massive congestion and keep it closed at all other times.
I hate to say it but stick average speed check cameras so limits are actually enforced. Too many people go 90MPH+ between cameras in these sections.
No more new smart motorways. Try to phase them out. For bigger roads. Population keeps getting bigger, more journeys, we need more capacity.
Smart motorways aren’t great but they’re not as bad as an OAP in charge of 1.5 tonne of steel travelling at speed. They shouldn’t be allowed on a motorway at the very least. I watched one plough her golf into a barrier on the M6 not long ago and I had one rear end a car three cars behind me, fucking them all including my van not long before that. One fell asleep and the other one just didn’t see the cars had stopped in front of him, must of hit us at full speed judging by all the damage. We were at a stand still in a 30 so not like brakes were slammed on or anything.
His missus gets out crying ‘he did the same not long ago’ …. Pffft get yourself an electric mobility scooter Arthur before you kill somebody.
No idea how someone thought smart motorways was even the slightest bit a good idea. Government should be sued to the bone over the deaths these have caused!
31 comments
A 77-year-old woman driving a Ford Ka then failed to see the van in time and hit it, causing the van to crush Mr Jacobs against the safety barrier.
The woman driving the other vehicles husband also died following the crash. Apparently video footage showed her driving very close to the rumble strips on the left side, and the van was only 65cm into the lane after he had pulled to the side. She made no attempt to change lanes, move or slow down according to video footage.
This sounds like it will be controversial for both opponents of smart motorways and also people who want OAP’s tested more regularly. The 77 year old woman sounds very much like she shouldn’t have been driving.
Doesn’t really sound like the smart motorway was at fault here, if someone is paying that little attention while driving they are going to kill someone eventually.
As always, the effort people will go to to avoid blaming drivers staggers belief.
Slamming into stationary objects is not the fault of the smart motorway, but on the other hand, if the quality of drivers is so low, maybe they should pause then.
Yes of course it’s the responsibility of drivers to pay attention and anticipate breakdowns like this. Yes, they’re responsible if they cause a collision like this. No, it isn’t “the fault” of the smart motorway. But that’s all irrelevant really. The ultimate aim is to have a safe road system for all, where the frequency of collisions like this is minimised, or even eliminated. And the best way to do this is to separate broken down vehicles from moving vehicles. Which is why hard shoulders are a good idea.
You can argue against this, but would you also argue for the removal of all pedestrian footways, preferring instead to walk in the carriageway, mixing with traffic? No, of course not.
This is why you get out of the vehicle and stand behind the crash barriers if you have to stop like this. There’s always going to be some idiot that isn’t looking at the road in front of them driving on your road eventually. Even on a proper hard shoulder you’re not safe at all.
Horrible situation all round.
Traffic was horrendous yesterday we were on the m25 and M4 the smart motorway bits did not seem to help any imo
However I have always been advised, if you break down on a motorway, get out of your car and stand behind the safety barrier.
The number of AA/RAC people who have been killed on the hard shoulder with a van with flashing lights is enough that there is a memorial wall in most of the buildings
Smart motorways should be made illegal. As should these new yellow lamppost average speed checks, whereby drivers will just frantically ‘jam on’ when they suddenly realise they haven’t been paying full attention.
Both creating accidents just WAITING to happen.
Bit of a tangent but you can’t trust drivers with shit – smart motorway or not they still act almost entirely within their own interests.
I’ve seen it multiple times now where a motorway is slowed due to an accident – and half the cars still shoot through, using the closed lane, overtaking, undertaking, travelling twice the posted speed limit.
This not only makes it dangerous for the broken down cars but also everyone else that is following the law, you end up with traffic moving at dangerously different speeds.
The inconvenience of driving at 40mph for 500 yards is too much for most people, people are awful.
Why do they design such a lane? Don’t they have certain safety standards for emergency lanes?
Motorways were safer without the smart motorway, people now pick a Lane and sit on it which is much more dangerous, people are bored when driving
Almost had a lorry crash into the back of me on a smart motorway. A caravan pulled into my braking space so I had to either swerve left into the barrier, hit the caravan, or take my chances moving into the right lane. My brain made me swerve right, luckily the lorry saw me and stopped. Wouldn’t have happened with a hard shoulder. Now I shit myself every time I’m on a smart motorway.
I had plenty of braking room in front of me as traffic was slowing, the moron towing the caravan decided it was for him to pull into to take the exit. Bastard almost killed me.
It sounds like this happened due to negligence/inability of the 77-year old driver than due to the smart motoryway system. She sounds like an accident waiting to happen.
Smart motorways are one of the dumbest things going which are made all the dumber by some clinically dumb drivers who use them (as per the driver who caused the death who can’t accept blame).
They really are only as *smart* as the people that use them, and not all drivers are *smart*. The M20 is a menace in Kent, and the M1 has had a bit of a reputation for some time now for being unhelpful with its signage in that it unreliably changes between lane open and lane closed, that people take that risk or don’t even know it until it’s too late.
All this could have potentially been avoided if hard-shoulders, which were always reliably useful, were kept separate and open rather than absorbed into the road for the sake of an extra lane. It’s not like drivers know how to use the left-most lane on a motorway anyway, the penultimate right-hand lane is the people’s choice of lane going by experience.
This was a tragic accident by design. It does not excuse the dangerousness of the lady driving but things could have been done to reduce those chances.
I still don’t really understand the benefit of smart motorways.
Whenever the left lane closes, traffic snarls up as a) 4 lanes of traffic now suddenly needs to compact into 3, and b) everyone gawps at the poor sod who caused a lane to close and the speed limit to drop to 50.
No one gawps at a broken down vehicle on the hard shoulder, and the speed limit stays at 70.
>Statements from some of them were read as evidence at the inquest. Some of the witnesses said Mrs Scripps described the van braking suddenly in front of her – despite the van having been stationary.
So he depth perception is what caused this. She didn’t realise the van wasn’t moving.
This is pretty heartbreaking all round but if we can agree on one thing it’s that Mrs Scripps should never drive again.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. When you get to 70 you should have to do a ‘safe to drive’ test which includes an eye sight test.
If someone doesn’t pass they should be given some form of a bus pass. Or even ban them from motorways or roads above 50mph. I see so so many elderly drivers on the road which shouldn’t be driving.
“Smart” motorways with dumb drivers.
Seriously, the average driver is a distracted moron, the amount of people who look like they’re driving drunk, can’t stay in their lane, driving like they’re the only person on the road etc.
You simply cannot expect these kind of drivers to not crash when something goes wrong like a car breaking down with nowhere to go.
Stop smart motorways and bring back hard shoulders FFS. Finally accept you need to be smarter about how you handle traffic, not the “add another lane” nonsense which LA, USA proves with its 20 lane gridlocked highways.
This is why I will never drive in the far left lane on a smart motorway, even if the signs show theyre clear and theres no traffic. Fuck that. Also if you do break down on these motorways, get over the barrier, up the embankment and be atleast 20 metres behind and past your vehicle.
These smart motorways are so badly designed and thought out. The junction nearest to me (M4 slough has the smallest slip road possible, no more than 100m. In that time you’ve got to get up to speed and find a gap. If you’re unlucky enough to get there when two lorries are passing by close together then you’re fucked. It’s only a matter of time before there’s a massive accident.
At least previously you could bail into the hard shoulder if a gap doesn’t appear. But now it’s just a crash barrier. Every time I enter the motorway it feels like I’m rolling the dice
Smart Motorways have to be the dumbest thing named “smart” in a long time.
What are you actually supposed to do if you break down and need to pull over on the motorway without a hard shoulder?
How about stopping old people from driving instead of reinstating hard shoulders? She was clearly not in the correct lane position if she collided with the van looking at the pictures.
Here’s the location from another angle
https://www.google.com/maps/@53.297392,-1.2919789,3a,75y,25.44h,81.76t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sUJc-FpMoOLugMFXhwyXodw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192
It was an unfortunate place to stop the van. Only about 50 metres prior there’s no barrier at all and they could have pulled over onto the grass verge. Another 150 metres of so and the barrier ends and the grass verge is accessible again. In half a mile there an emergency refuge area.
Why are people that old driving in the first place. Over 70s should be barred from driving, or at least be forced to have a driving test every couple of years
And she will suffer fuck all consequences for this as drivera are never ever held accountable properly for their actions…if you want someone dead use a car as you won’t see inside of a cell and things will be spun so your victim takes all the blame
5 seconds to react on a motorway, seriously that’s time to make a cup of tea, do some plastering, pack up every belonging in the house, and still have time to throw up a decent brick wall.
Ridiculous statement by the so called officer, as anyone who travels the motorway network knows.
I’m a mobile worker, and these things are utterly lethal, as the average drover pays very little attention to what is happening around them, or sits on the phone texting.
Unless the majority of drivers are going to get personality/IQ transplants, then safety needs to be designed in.
I’m absolutely livid that the government continues to defend smart motorways despite the clear danger they pose to drivers. This poor man’s death could have been prevented if there had been a hard shoulder available. When will the government listen to the concerns of drivers?
There needs to be more stringent tests on elderly people. Currently all they have to do is get a doctors signature saying they are fit to drive; even though the doctor has no idea what their reactions or awareness/perception is like.
I was in the car with an 80yr old family member recently and he went straight over a zebra crossing. As we approached it, a young woman with a pram started crossing the road. But my family member didn’t slow down. He flew right past her. I yelled at him, told him he almost killed a baby, and he told me most assuredly that there can’t have been anyone there because if there had been, he’d have seen them, and so I must have made it up.
The “smart” M4 between London and Reading scares the shite out of me. As much as I will always keep left, not on that stretch. We need a serious rethink.
We need to make it illegal to go in any red cross lane, proper camera enforcement. Plus massive awareness and fines.
Only use the extra lane when there is massive congestion and keep it closed at all other times.
I hate to say it but stick average speed check cameras so limits are actually enforced. Too many people go 90MPH+ between cameras in these sections.
No more new smart motorways. Try to phase them out. For bigger roads. Population keeps getting bigger, more journeys, we need more capacity.
Smart motorways aren’t great but they’re not as bad as an OAP in charge of 1.5 tonne of steel travelling at speed. They shouldn’t be allowed on a motorway at the very least. I watched one plough her golf into a barrier on the M6 not long ago and I had one rear end a car three cars behind me, fucking them all including my van not long before that. One fell asleep and the other one just didn’t see the cars had stopped in front of him, must of hit us at full speed judging by all the damage. We were at a stand still in a 30 so not like brakes were slammed on or anything.
His missus gets out crying ‘he did the same not long ago’ …. Pffft get yourself an electric mobility scooter Arthur before you kill somebody.
No idea how someone thought smart motorways was even the slightest bit a good idea. Government should be sued to the bone over the deaths these have caused!