When police say "speed was a contributing factor" to a road accident, isn't that already obvious because ?

Question

without speed, the car wouldn't have crashed in the first place?

Answer 1

Because drivers almost never admit to going over the speed limit when they wreck. The car could be nothing but a smoldering hunk of metal - and the driver will still tell the insurance company he was doing the speed limit -even when he does not know what the speed limit on that road is.

If you see that line (speed was a contributing factor) in a police report -- that's the officers way of saying the car was hauling *ss.  

The officers have some basic training to be able to approximate speed based on the collision damage. That line says the driver told the officer he was going a lot slower than he was. That line will frequently be accompanied with the appropriate citation.

Usually speed combines with other things to cause accidents.

Police reports have different ways of indicating what caused a wreck. Some the officer  marks a box or put s a number in -indicating a primary or secondary cause of the collision. But if  you see the line "speed was a contributing factor" actually written into the narrative - that's a sign that the car was moving and the speed was a main cause.  I have not seen that line written in when a car was only doing 5 mph over.

Answer 2

i think they mean that the car was going over the speed limit when they say it.

Theyd be better of saying "speeding was a contributing factor"

Answer 3

Speed is not always the cause of a collision.  One can be speeding but look down in the car to grab a cell phone and therefore, become distracted and can lose control of a vehicle.  In that example, distraction in the vehicle may have been the main contribution to the loss.

Failure to yield to oncoming traffic can cause a collision with or without speed.

There are numerous reasons/factors that contribute to a collision, speeding is only one.

Answer 4

No its' not obvious.  When a investigator works a accident he/she looks for the "primary Cause" of the crash and in about 95% of the cases speed did not "Cause" the accident but the speed of the car(s) hindered the avoidance of or taking a evasive move to avoid the crash.  Speed then "contributes" to the amount of damage or number of injuries.  In all my years as a Vehicle Homocide Investigator/ Crash Scene Reconstruction...the primary "cause" of the accidents was some sort of "Violation of Right of Way".

If a car is on a "Through" highway it doesn't matter whether its' doing 40mph or 80mph if there is nothing or no one to obstruct the Right of Way there is No accident......

Answer 5

sometimes.

last summer a car was goin 30 in a 35 on our corner n their tire (whats the word-maybe= slid.. on middle curb n the car went the other way n hit the hardware sign n it wrapped around the pole then it fell on car. the car was a full size but it was soo tight around the pole it was about 2 foot long. the cops etc say it did that cause is was hit just right. if i didnt see it i would have thought they wer goin 70mph. they both died.

Answer 6

They mean exceeding the speed limit.  Accidents occur due to ice or sun glare or even a medical emergency befalling the vehicle operator.  I had one where Junior flung a toy at the back of dads head while dad was driving.