Dangerous following

Jide OwatunmiseThis article on dangerous following, tailgating or blind following is designed for Pedestrians, Riders and all classes of drivers. Sometimes ago, I saw six women wanting to cross a major road. After waiting for a while, one of the women dashed to the road surprisingly,the remaining five women followed without taking the pain to see if it was safe for them to cross the road. Unfortunately, the last two women were crushed to death by an oncoming vehicle. In this case, there was a poor display of hazard perception skill by the driver and the women (pedestrians).Last week Friday on Port Harcourt to Enugu road, two Sienna cars belonging to the same Transport Companies were dangerously following each other with high speed. I personally warned one of the drivers against blind and dangerous tailgating. At a point, the driver at the front decided to overtake a heavily loaded truck and the second driver followed blindly without taking time to assess the potential hazards. The first driver who was seeing ahead more clearly passed the truck successfully but the second driver tailgating blindly was not as lucky. His car was crushed by an uncoming trailer. This incident ended up becoming a multiple accident.Tailgating by pedestrians, riders and drivers is dangerous and a common cause of road traffic crashes, injuries and death. All road users must always LOOK and THINK and then ACT. Let us look at these three steps for safer road use. LOOKLook far ahead into your path of travel to see the potential hazards ahead, look to your right and left sides for likely hazards. Look at the back to know if there is any danger behind. You must have the big picture of the road environment. That is, gather all the available information within the road environment.Having looked to know if there is any danger around you, then think on the likely consequences of any action you take at that moment. That is, interpret the information gathered to assess the identified risks. The quality of your interpretation is what will determine the action you will take. The action you take will subsequently determine your safety and the safety of others around you or otherwise.The eyes, ears and nose of road users must be actively available without distraction to gather information on the road. The brain of the road users must be free from emotional pressures and psychoactive substances to rightly interpret the information gathered from the road environment. The hands and legs of road users must be functioning effectively to prevent the identified hazards.As the activities of the yuletide continues, road users must be patient and avoid blind following or dangerous tailgating to further reduce the rate of road traffic crashes, injuries and deaths on Nigeria roads.
Click here to read full news..