No Way Out, No One to Blame

A lot of people have been writing about it and you may well be sick of the subject, but I just have to say my piece. Because, of all the things I’ve seen about the reasons for that horrific 81-vehicle crash in the fog just east of Windsor, Ont., (on Sept. 3, four days ago, as I write this) nobody’s got it right. Not a soul.

The police quickly concluded that excessive speed and aggressive driving combined with the fog to produce that carnage, where eight people lost their lives. How did they know? The mayor of Windsor said trucks were to blame, and our industry’s critics found this the right moment to warn that longer hours of work for drivers would lead to more carnage. Talk about naked opportunism-and lousy judgment.

Then there’s the issue of the road itself. God knows there’s been enough said about the so-called “killer” stretch of Hwy. 401 further east of the accident site, and I guess it was inevitable that more would follow. But the road’s got nothing to do with it.

The fact is, nothing-absolutely nothing-could have prevented that accident. Except maybe a complete lack of traffic when the fog fell.

Put yourself behind the wheel-truck or car, it doesn’t matter-at about 8 a.m. on a Friday morning just 20 klicks from the border crossing between Windsor and Detroit. If you’re heading for points east, you’re just settling into a new speed, a different sort of road, and you’ve got your eyes set on the horizon. You’re motoring. If you’re going toward the border, you’ve been doing some serious motoring for quite a while.

Traffic’s heavy as always, and it’s only two lanes each way, so you’d best have your wits about you. If you’re American, and many are on that stretch, you’re maybe a bit apprehensive, and you may or may not notice that the shoulders are gravel, not paved like you’re used to. As a sidebar, my colleague Jim Park says a policeman recently told him that all the accidents this year on the “killer” section of Hwy. 401 between Chatham and London involved American drivers or others unfamiliar with the 401 and its narrow lanes and gravel shoulders.

Anyway, everybody’s rolling, and then suddenly the fog. Apparently it just dropped out of nowhere like a blanket over the windshield. For a second, whether you know the road or not, you’re stunned. Do I slow down? Hit the binders? Will the fog lift sooner than I can react?

The more confident driver might just motor on, wary but sure that it will lift in a second. The fearful old dear in her tired Toyota might actually hit the brakes. And when she realizes it’s a serious fog, might even panic and hit them hard. The otherwise confident driver up front might actually jab the big pedal too, once the true nature of the fog is revealed.

Either one of those reactions, and anything in between, would have led to the same tragic result. Both drivers are almost sure to hit or be hit unless they happen to be the first or the last in line. Regardless of the speed being driven. The confident guy is going to run into somebody stopped or moving slowly up front. The old lady is going to be run over from behind. Nobody wins.

And nobody was at fault, except possibly the panicking Toyota. Can’t really blame her for braking, but in doing so she became an obstacle.

The truly quick thinker and decisive driver might do none of those things. He might calculate the considerable risks of staying on the roadway at all and decide to dive for cover off to the right or, more dangerously, into the median. Big risk, but probably smaller than staying on the asphalt.

Unfortunately, he’d probably get whacked anyway, and he might actually hit something solid off on the right-something he wouldn’t be able to see beforehand.

The only possible way to let that fog drop on heavy traffic moving at 100 km/h and have nobody hurt would be to have everybody react in precisely the same way. Slow down at exactly the same rate and carry on in the same relationship to one another. Fat chance. In fact, it’s impossible to conceive.

Trucks weren’t to blame because any collection of vehicles would have produced a terrible accident. The road wasn’t to blame because it could have happened anywhere. And speed wasn’t to blame because it wouldn’t much matter how fast you were going. Somewhere in there was some bad judgement, I suppose, but even good judgement wouldn’t have saved the day.

So, the only possible conclusion? Unavoidable. No matter what you read elsewhere.