I’ve been driving for 33 years. And I do a lot of driving.
I’ve only been in two accidents, and neither was my fault.
I have been in one accident in 35 years of driving. I was stopped at a stoplight and got rear-ended (dingbat on a phone). I’d like to think I’m an amazing driver, but the truth is for about 15 of those years I was seldom in a car (I was, however, in several train accidents and one bus accident in those years - I’m pretty sure none of those were my fault).
Six accidents in 12 years? Yeah, my first guess is that someone needs some remedial training. It might not be her fault, but odds are she’s contributing somehow. And if she’s getting rear-ended frequently I have to wonder what the hell is going on, does she like to slam her brakes on without warning or something?
I know this thread is old, but since it seems to have been revived…
I don’t think it automatically makes her a bad driver. I do think much of it depends on where she drives, how often she drives, the span of time in which they occurred, the specific situation in which they played out, etc. Defensive driving helps, for sure, but bad luck also happens.
I also think there is a wide gap between “bad” driver and one that can improve, if even defensively. Most people have room to improve…but having seen actual bad, scary drivers, I don’t think merely being in the wrong place at the wrong time, makes a person bad by default.
Having been an Uber driver for about 8 months now, my average weekly mileage has quadrupled and my number of near misses has REALLY increased. That’s especially because I often drive late at night downtown in a campus full of drunken students.
I haven’t had another accident yet, buy it’s only a matter of time, and it concerns me.
Two parts to not getting in an accident…
- Driving safely so you do not cause any accidents.
- Driving defensively and in a manner which WILL NOT ALLOW other drivers to potentially run into you. You notice dangerous situations and pull over to let a tailgater pass (will not allow someone else to tailgate you). Maybe pull off the street or highway if you see a bunch of other drivers around you driving dangerously. Let them pass!
Patience and having no problem waiting an additional minute or two to get to your destination can save your life and avoid accidents!
Being in a hurry WILL cause accidents!
I vote bad driver. I have a friend like this. I think it’s a combination of general obliviousness and shit reflexes without proper training to compensate for them. Most of the accidents he has been in have been ruled the other guy’s fault, but… he’s a bad driver.
Quoted from Voyager (above). My quoter box ain’t working:
*You didn’t see that they were not slowing down?
*
In two of the cases the driver was coming over a steep crest of a hill and not visible until I was halfway through the 4-way stop (that I have stopped at very carefully, not even a California roll :D). They both plowed through the intersection without even tapping their brakes.
The third case was a a student driver who was fully stopped, looked everywhere but to his left, and jetted out right into my passenger side when I was halfway thru the intersection.
Needless to say, I am paranoically cautious at 4-ways.
On the deer: he sprang out from a steep bank and wasn’t visible until a split second before I hit him. I do suspect artiodactyl suicide, though a “goodbye, cruel forest” note wasn’t on him.
The best thing I ever did was take motorcycle lessons in my twenties, 12 years after getting my driver’s licence.
Prior to this I had been in four collisions – two of which were caused by mechanical failures.
-One brand new tire doesn’t mix with snow and gravel. Hit by 18 wheeler.
-Making left-hand turn, off-duty police officer blows stop sign and changes lanes in intersection.
-Front tire of dad’s car blows out.
-Woman in left-hand turn lane decides to back up. I could hear her passenger telling her to stop.
Since then I haven’t had any close calls at all, but there are people I will not get into a car with. These people typically don’t get into crashes, but fail to realize that their driving behaviour causes crashes or just generally slows traffic behind them.
What Barbarian said.
If it is impossible to get at you, they can’t hit you.
Note: My turn signal is information for you. It is not a request.
If I am on my bicycle, go ahead, knock me over, just make sure you can get away in a city with heavy traffic and many slow light intersections. … Just sayin. 
Of course. Good drivers take a responsible place in the matrix of traffic, and are constantly conscious in advance of developing accident potentialities.
It is possible that really bad drivers don’t have accidents, either – they drive blithely on with the accidents they’ve caused receding in the rear view mirror.
And how they happened. One of mine was while I was stopped at a Stop sign; the driver behind me was reaching for something and lifted her foot off the brake pedal. Oops.
Zombie notice.
So accidents 2, 3, 4, and 5 were utterly craptacular driving on your part. #1 seems to be the other driver’s fault.
I agree you ought to move to a low traffic area. But for other people’s sake, not yours.
Assuming this is not you just poking fun at yourself, yes, given your list, I would say at the very least,you’re not as good a driver as you think you are.
You can get “Deer Whistles” which are mounted on your front bumper. The wind blowing through them as your car drives down the road scares deer away.
I installed these about 10 years ago and have not come across a deer standing fixed in the middle of the road since. This used to happen all the time, the deer would just be standing there in the middle of the road!
You might also want to stick an old camera on the front of your car. Every time I take out a camera to take a picture of deer, they scatter with a quickness! 
Just be careful not to mount them backwards, or you’ll wind up with a herd of deer thundering after you as you drive about.
My only “my fault” accident happened way back in 1989, when I was 23. The road was covered with packed snow, and it was a bright, sunny January day. I was moving maybe 10MPH, because I was trying to keep as much distance as possible between myself and the truck in front of me. My right turn was coming up, so I signaled and slowed down even further, then started into my turn. Less than halfway through the turn, I completely lost traction and slid in a straight line, oh so slowly, into the car that was stopped at the corner (he was preparing to turn onto the same road I was turning off). No injuries, and the damage was minimal - I was driving a 1972 Olds Toronado, and the other car was a '75 Cadillac. The nose of my car hit the front left corner of the Caddy, and our bumpers crunched.
Could I have avoided it? Absolutely. My one mistake was in not following the example of the driver ahead of me. The driver of the truck had attempted to turn right, started to slide, and immediately abandoned his turn and continued straight. I should have done the same. Or rather, after seeing that, I should have elected to not attempt the turn.
More than a year ago, defensive driving helped me avoid an accident. I had driven across a local bridge. At the end of the bridge, the lanes split into two left-turn lanes and two right-turn lanes (no “straight ahead”). In the nearest left-turn lane, three vehicles were stopped for the red light. Both right-turn lanes were empty, and I was going to turn right, so I moved into the right-turn lane … just as the driver of the second vehicle in the left lane apparently realized she was in the wrong lane. She went from “completely stopped” to “pulling into my lane with no warning”. I managed to stop just short of hitting her as she was halfway into my lane.
A few months ago I was waiting near the Safeway gas pumps to fill my tank. All the pumps were occupied, and I was maybe half a car-length behind a large pickup truck waiting for spots to open up. The driver of the truck for some reason decided to back up, and I managed to blow my horn half a second before he bumped me. Upon inspection there was no damage, so I waved it off.
I’ve been in six collisions in 50+ years, at fault in one.
I like to drive paranoid - I pretend that everyone on the road is trying to kill me. It’s amazing how perceptive you become with that mindset.
Before I was diagnosed with an eye disease, I had six accidents in two years. When I got a physical exam, it was found that I had huge gaps in my perepheral vision, explaining how all those cares “just came out of nowhere”. Once I knew about my blindness, I drove for 30 more years, without a single accident, because I knew about my own limitations and could neutralize them with caution and prudence.
I think my car at that time was like a mobile home in tornado alley, it seemed to attract misfortune. One of the six accidents occurred while it was paked in front of my house, and one was when I was stopped at a stop sign and the driver in front of me suddenly decided to back up.
There are certain places that are like a vortex of accidents just sucking cars into it, like Montreal. Drivers in minor accidents there don’t even stop, they just rudely gesture at each other and drive on.