Your thoughts on an incident
Hi Guys,
I am taking a company to court for damage to my caravan. I have attached a link to my yourtube video, I was wondering as fellow carravaner's you would be able to give some input on your thoughts.
As I was sat in the Que of traffic both barriers were in the upright position throughout. You will see when I pull away the opposite side starts to come down, the attendant see's this, checks my position but didn't warn me, you can see by his facial expressions he knew something was wrong - my window was open throughout.
The CCTV makes the road look large but it is very narrow for tourer's in my opinion considering the fence to the kerb side and to the fact that the barriers meet each other in the middle of the road when both are closed. The direction I was going the road continued the bend as you can see behind me.
As I set off I knew I had to go over a speed bump, both my car and caravan, there is a blind spot to my left and I was aware that there could be cyclists and I wanted to avoid the fence that was erected at the side of the road. My car was in my lane throughout and my caravan overhung by 2 inches into the opposite carriageway on impact. The road ahead was clear.
As the barrier descends and from my angle I didnt see it, I had an A pillar which from the angle I was going towards the barrier it would always look as though it was in the upright position if that makes any sense, I glanced ahead and it was clear so I was checking my mirrors again whilst glancing directly ahead for any oncoming vehicles.
I have attached a photo of the road and the natural line that is taken even by cars alone.
Anyways I would love some feedback to reassure me as I have the court date next week.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiolaCy-Rc4
Thanks
Ian
Comments
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Interesting.
The chap in the yellow jacket clearly has chance to shout a warning to you, there is no sound (not on my computer anyway) but you say he doesn't shout a warning and he certainly doesn't appear to........
But the barrier is quite clearly coming down on the other side of the road as you set off. You could ( or should) have seen that. You drive into it.
Both at fault. If I was the judge I'd say 50/50, the site should pay for the damage to its barrier and you pay for the damage to your caravan.
Sorry if that's not what you want to hear, but that's how it appears to me.
There's no photo attached so can only base my opinion on the CCTV presented.
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I agree. Faults on both sides.
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"…there is a blind spot to my left and I was aware that there could be cyclists and I wanted to avoid the fence that was erected at the side…"
I might be wrong here but I can’t see a nearside extension mirror.
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As other posters have pointed out the "blind spot?" is by looking at the pictures of your own making, by not having a nearside extension mirror,which has caused you to move across from your lane towards the middle of the road and as the c/van has followed your path by the looks crossed into the out barriers natural down path,,and i would also wonder how you missed it coming down,
IMHO i would bite the bullet and not try to make any other claim than on your insurance for any damage to both your LV and the companies barrier you damaged
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Goodchild, my sympathy for you. I watched the video and said Ouch.
But I don't know the role of the yellow jacket man, why he stopped you before the Stop line, whether some other human was controlling the barriers, and I don't recognise the location - so best not for me to act as judge.
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Not in my experience.
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It is a simple matter to make a decision by measuring the width of the caravan across the road from a point on one of the markings that the nearside wheel is clearly crossing. This will show if, and by how much, the caravan is across the centre of the roadway.
In that there are four letters in the word "STOP" (which was not complied with by the driver) and a small space to either side, and that the near side of the caravan was completely missing going over the "S", I would contend that the offside of the caravan was across the centre.
Does the rubbish collecting lorry pass through a single barrier?
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Whilst there appears to be plenty of room on the nearside for you to pull through safely what we can't see is what was ahead of you that made you pull over towards the middle of the road. If there was something blocking a clean exit maybe, just maybe you might have a case. From what we can see on the video, and I don't wish to sound unsympathetic as it must of been horrible, but you changing position on the way through the barrier was the cause of it hitting your van. I am a bit surprised you have rushed to court over this, have you actual taken legal advice? To me it seems more of an insurance claim. How did the site react to the problem?
Please let us know how you get on.
David
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A helpful lorry driver once helped me out in a tight manouvering situation in my motorhome, adding the advice " Use your rear-view mirrors even when moving forward". Had you done so, you would have been able to avoid the damage. A plastic barrier desiged to break as it did surely didn't cause enough damage to warrant the aggro you're now facing. I hope the court action isn't viewed as being 'vexatious'!
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When the barrier started moving you should have stopped!
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You wont want to hear this but i agree with the majority of posters. You were too far over and could of easily been closer to the nearside. You have no extension mirror on the nearside so probably didn't have a clear view. You should have been aware of the barrier coming down and taken action. I cant see a court action doing anything but costing you more money. In my view its a simple claim on your insurance.
Have you sent this video to your insurers?
What is their opinion?
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Ian, our caravan was damaged in slightly similar circumstances, on the narrow approach to a French campsite through a chicane and entrance and exit barrier. We had been waved to go through the entrance barrier, which then came down when it shouldn't have between the car and the caravan (undoubtedly the fault of the barrier).
Unfortunately in our case the barrier didn't snap off but scraped along the caravan. We never thought to make a court case of it, but simply put it down as an accident, claimed from our insurers (Towergate), they assessed the damage, paid our claim, and our premiums didn't go up as a result. We didn't have to repair any damage to the barrier as it was still intact, just a bit scratched!
I think you will find that had you been using towing mirrors which are a legal requirement on almost all UK cars, that you would have seen that there was plenty of room between you and the fence and kept over to your side of the road. Had you done that the barrier would not have hit your caravan.0 -
Although I have every sympathy, as the design of the entrance arrangements, is an accident waiting to happen. I am afraid I must agree with others, you should have exercised more care and remained on your side of the road. The video shows the side of the van level with the end of the T on STOP. The site in its defence will be able to supply a photo with a tape showing the distance to the fence, which looks considerable. That and the lack of a nearside mirror are likely to reflect badly on your argument.
The barrier was descending as you approached it. If I was the site I would be saying you should have seen it and even been looking out for it if you were moving into the opposite carriageway. It could be argued as unwise in any event, as if it had started descending after you passed, it could have impacted the rear of the caravan. You perhaps have more of a case if the barriers were under manual control, but you don't state this.
Personally I would claim on my insurance for the van and argue that they should pay for the cost of the barrier due to bad design. A fact that had obviously been considered with how easily it detached. History of other vehicles hitting it would aid your arguement. However, I would be reluctant to take even this element to court.
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We had a Barrier come down on our last coachbuilt motorcaravan at MIM as we were passing through ,they were only useing the one barrier for both ways as they were resurfacing the roads,,I had a letter from the regional manager apologising and accepted responsibility
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All down to you in my opinion, if you had had two mirrors fitted like the law requires you to have you would have been able to position yourself better on the road and not cut the corner with the caravan. Save your money and put it down to experience your on a loser if you pursue it and may end up having to pay the barriers owners cost.
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Sorry to disappoint but this looks to me as an unfortunate accident. I would treat this as such and make a claim on the insurance - after all that what it is there for. In no circumstance would I consider legal action unless you can afford lose a lot of money if/when the case goes against you which I think is quite likely
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Agree with above, you should be able to see down both sides of the caravan and as your van is wider than your car you obviously could not as you admit above. Seems you were in the middle of the road and hit the barrier that you could see coming down, the onus is not on the person to tell you to stop (but obviously it would have been helpful). So I think if you go to court you would lose and maybe get points and or fine for not having mirrors fitted.
I'm afraid you need to bite the bullet and pay up...
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I agree that the accident was due to the OP but ..... every other barrier I've come across has had pressure pads across the entrance &/or a photo cell 'looking' across the road such that in a situation such as this the barrier would at least stop coming down.
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Thankyou for all your input. Unfortunately on the A1 driving to the site a strap on my nearside mirror snapped and I had to remove it just incase it came off and hit another vehicle. I always drive with two mirrors as a rule. Just unfortunately this happened on the day if the incident.
As I was there I never seen the barriers open or close, to me they were up and the road ahead was clear. He asked me to go ahead and gave no indication that the barriers were in operation, I moved over to avoid the fence, I was being careful in my opinion. The attendant could see it come down and didn't say anything, my car stayed within my carriageway and my caravan overhung the white line by two inches.
I have been in contact with the company who installed the barriers and they told me that they recommended for photocells and remote control fobs to be utilised but the park at the last minute decided not to have them installed. These devises have since been installed onto the barriers and they are counterclaiming the cost of them to be fitted onto myself.
My caravan was 2 feet from the fence on impact.
CCTV shows the road to be really wide but in fact it is pretty narrow. I will upload a pic.
I take everything onboard and thanks for everyone's time, although if yourselves were in a position were you could take extra room to be cautious in the thought that everything would be fine, let alone the attendant walking alongside my car and never informes me, I would like to think yourselves would like to use extra space.
Yes it was an acceidnt but it could have been avoided if they had adequate safety devices installed as recommended through a risk assessment and as it is the attendants duty to make sure people and property enter safely negligence is on him as he did not inform me.
Ian
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Hate to say it, but I think a lot of what you are saying is Solicitor wriggle. Don’t forget they get paid even if you lose, so think carefully about the cost of all this over what only looks to be trivial damage to your van.
Sorry, but I don’t think things will work out in your favour.
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It probably needs reducing. You’re welcome to email the pic to me and I’ll have a go if you want. Email address in my profile.
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