I
have worked a recent string of lethal car accidents involving expensive exotic
cars. It got me thinking about having
too much power. The car as in 0-60 in three-ish seconds with an engine of five
hundred hoarse power or more. The driver as in someone who ignores the law
because his or her shirts are tailor made.
We
don’t let ten year olds drive. They are too small in so many ways. Its one
thing not to be able to reach the controls, another not to be able to reach for
the wisdom needed to navigate traffic. Some
people turn ten when they get into a sports car. I so often see privileged
people getting into accidents for no other reason they feel the laws of mankind
don’t apply to them. Physics has something to say about this. So does Darwin. I have never known of an Ferrari winning and
argument with a trash truck or abutment. I’m not picking on Ferrari, Maserati
or McLaren will do. Okay fine you’re a GT freak or perhaps you will only allow
a Bugatti into your dreams. Just pick a super car and stick with me. Gads I can
hear the snidely voices of the read about it type, cant even afford the floor
mats, snot nosed wussburger getting all flabbergasted at me. Blow the aghast
out your nose, wipe up and lets move on.
A
special investigative team will sometimes come out to an accident and record
every piece of evidence. The position of vehicles and strewn parts is
meticulously recorded with the help of a laser based robotic Total Station. One
can also see these amazing machines on construction sites. This device will
give the nearly exact position with elevation of every bit they decide to
record. Later all the rocket science of weight and velocity is computed by
someone that knows what they are doing. Glad it’s not me because a five-hour on
scene time turns into three days or so of calculating and weeks of interviews.
Photos taken at the scene are included into a remodeling of the accident.
I
photograph things important to the investigator, every side of the vehicles and
details of some parts. I am sometimes amazed at what blood will be found on.
Pieces of front bumper or headlight with some human matter painted on says body
contact even too an amateur like me. It’s the ability to play the scene
backward that starts the narrowing of the investigators concentration. They are
tested and exhaustively reviewed in continuing education. Glad I just take the
photos mostly done on manual. Program is only used for close ups with flash set
to TTL. I go back and forth between the settings.
No
million-dollar car is safe with defective parts like say a loose nut behind the
wheel. Before you admire someone in a tailored shirt without a tie wreaking
perfume, imagine him in an expensive go-cart becoming road coating. That will
take the shine off the rims.
