This woman was probably concentrated on traffic in the turn lane, she forgot to check for traffic headed her way.
Presumed Mississippi resident and Redditor /u/BMW_Z3 shared shocking dashcam footage from Hattiesburg showing the unfortunate accident caused by an elderly driver pulling out into traffic without properly checking cross traffic first.
Check out /u/BMW_Z3’s dashcam footage below.
[oc] old lady pulled out in front of me and another guy. Pics and rear cam in comments
byu/bmw_z3 inIdiotsInCars
The accident happened at the intersection of Hardy St. and S. 28th Ave (exact location on Google Maps linked here.)
As OP’s dashcam footage shows, he’s driving along Hardy St. in the left lane approaching a busy T-intersection.
We can see a white Buick Verano stopped and then pull out into traffic as OP and a BMW 3-series on his left approaches (they have the right of way, here.)
The driver in the Buick doesn’t make it to her turn lane in time and gets T-boned by the other car, and then OP in a rare back-to-back occurrence.
Her side airbags can be seen deploying at the moment of impact.
The driver in the Verano ends up high-centered on the raised center divider.
“I think she was concentrating on the last car in the turning lane so she could get behind it, and then completely forgot the oncoming traffic from the left. Both her and you might have been lucky that the BMW hit her rear door first, lessening the impact on her and your car,” /u/BestButtons commented with the likely explanation.
After the collision, you can hear other cars around them honking for some reason.
OP replied to a self-proclaimed driving instructor that, contrary to what the dashcam shows, the crash was all but avoidable.
“I had less than 2 seconds to react, and stop. An alert driver has a reaction time of 1~ second, so that means I had 1~ second to come to a complete stop. Cars do not stop instantly, they take several seconds at best. Completely unavoidable.”
OP posted rear dashcam footage to where you can hear his brakes screeching, as he slammed down on them, and can see how violently his head whipped around, too.
OP also posted some aftermath photos showing the severity of the accidents. His BMW Z3 is totaled.
Thankfully, OP doesn’t say anyone was seriously hurt or injured, although he did reassure other Redditors that he did get himself checked out.
It goes without saying but making it into a turn lane across one or several lanes of traffic involves making sure it’s all clear before driving across.
Age is arguably a contributing factor here, too.
Although anyone would hate to do it, there comes a time when you decide not to drive anymore.
It’s better to decide voluntarily before the warning signs catch up to you and you, like this poor woman, get into an expensive accident.
