Am I at fault in this accident?

Question

Okay, so I just got home after being involved in a fender-bender on the way here. The circumstances were thus:

- While driving home, the car two cars ahead of me was cut off by a van who swerved into the lane.

- The car two ahead of me veered into the guardrail and spun out of control, spreading debris everywhere and coming to a rest on the guardrail in our lane. (Nobody was hurt, thank goodness!)

- The SUV in front of me immediately came to a screeching halt just short of the car two ahead that went into a tailspin.

- I saw the SUV coming to a quick stop and hit the brakes myself, but was unable to come to a complete stop and hit the corner of his rear bumper with my front bumper.

There was no speeding involved, I was about three seconds behind (I count by telephone poles), and made every effort within reason to avoid hitting his SUV. The SUV driver also acted reasonably. The result was a small dent to each vehicle's corner bumper. Am I at fault here? How? Why?

Answer 1

Yes, because you were tailgating no matter what you say and whenever you hit the rear of someone's vehicle it is your fault.  If you cannot stop behind a vehicle that makes a sudden stop then you are to blame for the collision.

Driver-idiots just never seem to get this.  I live in New Jersey and see these damned fools all the time, riding right up on someone's bumper.  There is only one word for this, and it is "stupidity".

I bet you were sending a text message on your cell phone at the time.

Answer 2

You are at fault about 99.9% of the time when you rear end someone.  Following too closely, failure to have vehicle under control.  If you have insurance, "fault" is of little consequence to you and is highly overrated by most.

Please do not begin a question with the dreaded "okay so"

Answer 3

You are at fault for striking the vehicle in front of you.  Regardless of almost any situation, you should be following far enough away from the vehicle in front of you to control your vehicle in the event of such an incident.  When conditions change, so should your following distance.  Examples would be at night or in bad weather.

Sorry you were involved in this accident but glad you didn't get hurt.

Answer 4

Yes.  

The SUV had to make an emergency stop.

You were following him too closely.  You are supposed to keep enough distance between you and the vehicle in front of you - that he can make an emergency stop with out getting hit.

You say you were 3 seconds behind.  Remember drivers ed? You're supposed to be 12 seconds behind the car in front of you.

The suv had enough distance to avoid hitting the car that lost control and hit the guard rail. You did not have enough distance to avoid hitting the suv.

You are at fault for the damage to the suv.

Answer 5

Well, hate to tell you but you are at fault for the damages you caused to the vehicle in front of you & your damages.  If you hit someone in the rear, no matter what they did, you were following too closely.  It is your responsibility to be sure you can stop in time to avoid hitting the person in front of you.  File under your collision coverage, if you have it (if you don't you have to pay for your damages yourself).  Your company will pay for the damages to the other car, up to your policy limits, anything more than that, you will owe.

Now, we were taught in drivers ed to stay 1 second (counting, 1 "one thousand" or 1 "mississippi") for every 10 mile per hour you are driving.  So, if you were going 50 mph, you need to stay 5 seconds behind, not 5 telephone poles - 60 mph is 6 seconds.  If you are going 50, you will pass more than one pole per second, maybe if you were going 30, it could be a pole a second.

Answer 6

Yes you are considered at fault as you should have had enough distance between you and the vehicle ahead of you.