Could it be target fixation?
Highway hypnosis, or lost concentration I’d say.
I’ve almost done it myself.
Kohls department stores offers 15% off to senior citizens each Tuesday. I think it’s a crappy policy. Most seniors that I know are doing fine financially, thanks to pension and SS and savings. Compare them to single moms, who are struggling to pay the mortgage, school related costs, insurance premiums, groceries, and new clothes every 6 months because the kids keep growing. The assumption used to be that seniors were living on a fixed income and working people were getting routine raises. That’s not the case anymore.
So why not give single parents a break?
And, no, I’m not a single mom.
Damn, Dinsdale, that had to be awful to witness. I can totally understand being freaked out (for lack of a better term) at how it happened and why.
I have a question about how road construction handles freeway lane closures there and elsewhere. I see from the Flickr photo they have the orange barrels, but do they have them before the lane closure starts, or only after the arrow truck?
Around the Detroit area, you have a bunch of “gonna have to get the fuck over” signs (both of the orange and black post signs weighed down with sandbags and the electronic boards on overpasses) for a couple miles. Then there’s a looooong, gradual tapering of the lane before it’s fully blocked off. I often see more than one arrow truck set on the tapering closure, gradually set further from the shoulder to fully in the closed lane. The barrels are set apart where a car COULD get between them if moving SLOWLY but not at normal freeway speeds. Do other areas do this?
I’m wagering that the barrier truck was going to lay down barrels to close the lane but hadn’t done so yet, or was in the process of picking up barrels. We do use the gradual merge method around here nearly all the time.
I think you might have posted this in the wrong thread.
The simple answer to both of these scenarios is to not follow so closely behind the car in front of you.
While this is true, the older I get the more I’m convinced a lot of those close followers don’t actually know how close they are. (I’m not saying this about any posters here) I know three people in just the last year who finally went to an eye doctor after much cajoling and teasing from co-workers about their squinting habits. Two in late 20’s and one in early 30’s. Turned out all three of them were fairly significantly nearsighted and two of them were driving every day. I don’t think the 2-second rule worked for them because they couldn’t actually visualize a landmark well enough to use for counting.
Really. Effing. Scary. I think/worry there are a LOT of people like that out there.
I wonder if the motorcyclist from the OP could see distance as well as he thought he did.
I don’t understand how he could’ve been daydreaming or watching the black car; he was traveling at 80mph on a bike. Once he got above 30 or 3rd gear wouldn’t he have thought 'Uh Oh, I should be careful and not ride into something hard, because that’s what your body is screaming at you when you go fast on a bike?
Your speed is only relative to the object you’re going towards. If you’re barreling along a freeway where everyone is doing 60-80 then an object you might hit will only be going a little slower than you. If you’re in town doing 80 there are plenty of hard, solid things that are doing 80mph less than you.
Of course, but on busy freeways, if you’ve left a few car lengths between you and the next car, someone will move over into your lane, or pass you, and your safe following distance disappears.
Easier to do when you’re the actual driver.
Thanks for the responses, all. Yeah, I figured that was they guy. 47, from Huntsville, AL.
I guarantee the truck was smack-dab in the middke of the lane. Heck, I’m not even sure there is much of a shoulder there. And the bike was right in the middle of the lane as well.
I couldn’t swear what led up to the closure, but my sense is there were a bunch of "Get your ass over " signs. Before I heard the guy was from out of town, I figured he was a local who was just used to barrelling up the L lane, which normally continues another 10 miles into downtown. Such a person might not be expecting nightly lane closures.
Whatever signage there was, it was enough that I was well aware the lane was closing, before I saw where it closed quite a way ahead.
I thought of stopping, but didn’t for several reasons. First, I was quite shaken, in the 3d lane in on a major highway, with construction barrels blocking the lane to my left. I seriously thought trying to stop would be dangerous. Second, my main thought was to call 911. I assume the call took at least a minute - taking me a mile further down the road. Third, from what I saw, there was no doubt in my mind the guy was dead. I wasn’t eager to get a closer look.
I called 911, and they transferred me to the state po-pos. I’d assume they could figure out how to get in touch with me if the wanted anything from me. Finally, I didn’t want to put myself in a position where someone would be questioning whether I did anything wrong.
Thanks for everyone’s concern about me, but I’m fine. Still a little shakey behind the wheel, but that will pass.
and I really can’t imagine what I could say to the guy’s family that would make them feel better.
Gotta admit I was happy I was not a car length or 2 back, or bits of the bike - or the rider - might’ve hit my car, causing me to crash. And the radio said there was a huge delay - the entire road was blocked for the investigation.
There were exactly my thoughts when I read the OP. He and the sedan are driving about 10 mph faster than traffic, he’s using the car like a lead blocker, and he’s several seconds behind, so he doesn’t have to be focused on road.* The car zips over at the last second, possibly without signaling and certainly without a long lead time, and unless the bike rider is hyper focused on the car, he could have missed the move for a second or so.
Damn. Sorry the OP had to witness that.
*“Doesn’t have to be focused on the road” means that it’s technically possible to depend on someone else to pay attention for you, but obviously not a good idea.
That sounds like a REALLY plausible explanation of what happened. Traffic was light and predictable enough that the biker could have just figured focussing on the car was enough, alowed him to daydream or whatever, taking his attention from whatever construction warnings there were. He might have been looking at the major train work immediately to his left. I can’t recall any turn signal by the sedan, and the sedan did pull in front of me on the abrupt side.
Know this, no one climbs on a motorcycle without being aware that no matter how good their driving skills may be, at any moment their life may depend on split second reaction times.
A moments distraction, just broke up with girlfriend, or just got some great news, either way, that momentary lapse can cost you your life.
They knew this to be true when they got on their bike. As did the insurance company. As did their loved ones. I don’t think it was suicide, from what you’ve written, just another highway tragedy.
I’m sorry you had to see this. (Keep talking to those around you, it’s good for you.)
If he had been zoned out, his brain was on autopilot, just tracking the car, and momentarily missed the car when it moved over into your lane, his brain’s autopilot would try to locate the car again, and may not immediately register the truck, no matter how brightly colored it was.
There are been a great deal of experiments on how the brain works, and many industries are making changes to procedures and equipment to get people out of autopilot mode. For example, air controller now tell pilots to taxi to the waiting position and “hold” rather than “hold for takeoff” as the latter has been found to click an automatic response in the pilots, with possible tragic results.
Other studies famously show that automobile drivers simply do not register motorcycles and “see through” them. One major difference between small children or certain types of autistic people and adults is the inability to shut out distracting imagines.
While this is on the extreme side, I think this is entirely possible. Assuming he was following somewhere between one to three seconds behind the car (or even a few seconds more), he could have been looking off to the side or his autopilot could have momentarily shut off and not registered the car moving over. When his autopilot attempted to pick up the car, it could scan first and ignore the truck until it was too late.
While not an everyday occurrence, there certainly have been many accidents where people just space out and drive into things.
Another vote for object fixation here. Likely too focused on the car and not enough on his surroundings, when the car cut in “cut in just a little closer than I would have though optimal” he could follow and had to assimilate his new surroundings at 80 mph. A tall task for anyone, and a major reason rider training harps on not “following” the car in front of you.
The worst result from an all too common error. 
I’ve enjoyed the little reading I’ve done about vision and perception. It is astounding how little we actually “see” at any time. To a large extent, we move through the world based on what we “saw” previously, or what we expect to see.
When translated to driving, it can make me wonder at the fact that there aren’t more accidents!
That whole “focusing on the car in front of you” thing is exactly the reason I taught my children to look past that car and scan the road ahead as far as you can see. That way you can detect the things the car in front of you will have to react to and plan accordingly. You do have to keep an eye on the guy in front of you to make sure he doesn’t do something stupid or unexpected (same thing with the folks behind you and to both sides), but that should never be your focal point. Hell, I’ve even been known to change lanes if necessary to get out from behind a large vehicle that blocked my view of the road ahead.