Another 6 bites the dust!

Yet another express bus accident, 6 precious lives sacrificed. The bus concerned ploughed into 2 cars that had collided on the highway; then plunged into a ravine and turned turtle. Was the bus running too fast, over the speed limit?

Bad judgement and plain bad luck accounts for most accidents. Buses are getting more powerful with turbocharged engines that enable them to easily overhaul a small car on the straight. Vehicular performance is enhanced each day while driving skills of the average driver do not keep up.

Installation of black boxes for long haul buses remains a bad idea. These data recorders are good only for pinpointing cause and blame in the aftermath of an accident. When innocent victims have gone to the great beyond. They do not prevent mishaps and loss of lives. What should have been done was to adopt the speed limiter similar to that found in high end cars which limits to them to 250kph. In the case of buses, the limit should be 90kph, yet we can frequently see them flashing past at 130kph or more on the expressways.

I wonder if the relevant agencies have the means to download and expertise to analyse the black box's recorded data. Isn't it much better to prevent the disease than having to bother about the cure later? In this case, there is really no cure. People have been needlessly sacrificed and lives wrecked.

Massive re-thinking is needed here. It is much easier to prescribe equipment changes by law than to instill safer driving attitudes. No amount of exhorting of safe driving is going to do any good if recalcitrant drivers are hell bent on proving they are better than Schumacher or Alonso.

Meanwhile, for longevity perhaps a course on defensive driving would be a good investment.