Why do YOU think the Thais are such bad drivers?

[Ginjaninja]

The Hua Hin Bangkok hospital crossing is talking but it's in Thai......
At the moment the green 'safe(ish) for pedestrians to cross man' is not working.
GN.

[hhfarang]

Enjoy it while you can - it's just one of the things which make living here so much fun.

Yeah, fun until one of these bad Thai drivers causes YOU to have an accident and YOU get blamed because YOU are a foreigner with a fat wallet or real insurance. It has happened to me twice and to several friends. It may be better to run from the scene of an accident if your car will still drive!

[migrant]

Just saw a show on the travel channel from a series titled "Don't drive here" and it was in Bangkok

The premise of the series is the guy goes to places around the world known for bad driving and, well, drives. In BKK he drove a couple types of bikes, a pickup, a ambulance and a tuk tuk.

The guy is a bit obnoxious, and repetitive, but the placement in BKK makes it interesting.

[Bristolian]

http://www.thailand-business-news.com/n ... ities.html

Thailand Business News
Thailand ranks the world’s third in highest road fatalities

Thailand now ranks third in the list of countries having highest road traffic deaths worldwide with 38.1 road fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants per year in 2010.

The highest rate in road fatalities is Eritrea at 48.4, and Libya 40.5, two African countries among the poorer and the least developed in the world.

In other words: Thailand is at the level of poor African countries when it comes to road safety. Thailand might appear to be in third place if you look at the raw figures of WHO study, but considering the two “competitors” of Thailand, it may be fair to consider the kingdom as the worst ranking in the world.

Road fatalities remained high despite of the road safety campaign because enforcement of road safety laws on risk factors such as wearing crash helmets, drunk driving, and speeding was not tough enough.

According to WHO, road traffic injuries caused an estimated 1.24 million deaths worldwide in the year 2010, down from 1.26 in 2000. Half of the road traffic deaths are among pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists, and adults aged between 15 and 44 years account for 59% of deaths. 3 out of 4 road deaths are among men. The average rate was 18% per 100,000 people (down from 20.8 in 2000). 92% occurred in low and middle income countries, with Southeast Asia and Africa having the highest rates. Thailand has the rate of 38.1 road fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants per year, and 118.8 road fatalities per 100,000 motor vehicles.

[Hilux]

A recent example... Some would probable argue that it is the (presumably thai driven) pickup that drives irresponsible and others (probably most) will blame the farang bike for speeding.
I think that we (falangs) often see thai drivers as poor drivers because we do not understand why they make the choises they do trafficwise - which for us seems like unpredictable behaviour. On the other hand I know for certain that many thai drivers look at falangs the same way, and for the same reason.



Luckily no one was injured - but it was close.

Hilux

[Ginjaninja]

you've no margin of error riding at that kind of speed... he must have been pretty skilled to out-maneuver the truck though. I recon I would have went into 'panic-mode' and kept the bike on it's original course..
GN.

[Big Boy]

With the exception of not seeing him indicate, if I had to take sides, I would probably side with the pick-up (spot the pick-up driver ). However, it would be interesting to get an official view from a Thai Traffic Cop (OK, I know it would never happen). As Hilux says, blame could be apportioned either way. An official view could surprise us.

[Ginjaninja]

I don't think you can blame the pick-up driver in this case. The Z1000 was way too fast and the pick-up driver probably couldn't see him coming let alone judge his speed. You drive at that speed and something is going to go wrong (edit: sooner or later).....
GN.

[Hilux]

you've no margin of error riding at that kind of speed... he must have been pretty skilled to out-maneuver the truck though. I recon I would have went into 'panic-mode' and kept the bike on it's original course..
GN.

I think you are beeing modest here
But please don't try it anyway. The worst mistake unexperienced riders do is to panic and only focus on the obstacle instead of on where to escape.

Hilux

[lomuamart]

No wonder so many people die on the roads here when someone rides like that. Totally irresponsible IMHO.
You see, people just can't guage the speed - spacial awareness and so on. Jeeze, I have enough difficulty walking across Petchkasem as some mad idiots are coming at me at 2 kph and other 200 kms.
Bearing in mind that most drivers here don't use their mirrors, how could a bike rider going at that speed ever say that the vehicle in front was in the wrong if the bike piled up in the back?
Let alone a kid or old person crossing the road, minding their own business and used to slower vehicles. A misjudgement of speed and well...
Sorry, a bit of a rant but any person who wants to drive/ride fast, well OK but keep that speed off public roads.

[hhfarang]

I'm with you Lomu, I drive, but as safely as the others let me! The roads here are total mayhem!

[buksida]

I've seen that a thousand times (at much lower speeds), some idiot in a pickup dawdling across the highway because they have no idea how to judge speed or simply dont care (its just as bad when you're doing the speed limit). That said the bike was doing in excess of 200kph which is just a death sentence on these roads.

I think if you tried that on the road from Hua Hin to Prachuab you'd destroy the bike before you arrived! I almost got wiped out twice on that very road last week by assholes in trucks that violently swerve into the outside lane without looking to avoid a pothole, take care out there.

[Nereus]

Last week a young driver was killed instantly when a 40 ft sea container fell off a truck on an overpass. The container flattened the van the driver was in on the main road below.

The following is something that I have complained about for years. Sea containers have a socket on the bottom of each corner of the box which matches up with a locking pin on the bed of the truck. The problem is the lock has to be turned about 180 degrees after the container is placed on the truck, to engage the lock. Of course, this involves the driver getting out of the cab and WALKING around the truck to engage the locks. I have seen literaly hundreds of containers sitting on trucks without the lock engaged.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/transpo ... er-tragedy

"According to Mr Chadchart, more than 70% of lorry drivers fail to fasten the containers to their vehicles, as they believe the whole lorry could be at risk."
........................................................
It just surprises me that there are not a lot more "accidents" due to this, but I suppose that the biggest percentage of them are not reported. BEWARE!

[Nereus]

Another innocent life lost because of some a---hole. Probably left some poor kids without a mother as well.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/breakingnews ... ruck-wheel

Vendor killed by flying truck wheel

Published: 16 Feb 2014 at 16.18Online news: .A female vendor selling grilled pork and chicken on Bang Na-Trat highway was killed after being hit by a wheel that fell from a trailer-truck on the overhead expressway between kilometre markers 40 and 41 in Chachoengsao's Bang Pakong district on Sunday morning.

Pol Lt Jakrit Sesnavej of Bang Pakong district police station said the accident occurred at 7.45am in front of the electric wire factory Hanava Electronics (Thailand) Co.

The woman was identified as Prasert Yulab, 42, a native of Muang district in Sukhothai province. She was driving her modified sidecar selling grilled pork and chicken along the highway.

Darika Nimking, 36, a resident of tambon Bang Samak and an employee of the factory, said while walking to the electric wire production plant she saw a wheel fall from a green trailer-truck heading for Chon Buri. The wheel flew over the expressway railing and dropped down onto the highway, hitting Mrs Prasert and then a power pole.

The truck kept heading towards Chon Buri, probably unaware of what happened.

Pol Lt Jakrit said it was an accident. The trailer-truck was registered in Bangkok with the licence plate 70-0631. Chon Buri police were contacted to intercept the vehicle, he said.

[Khundon1975]

That guy on the bike is an idiot (I could easily have had to write Was an idiot) riding at that speed.
I don't give a shit if he kills himself but we could easily be watching him killing some poor kid on a bicycle or a pedestrian.

If idiots want to ride at that speed, get on a track and they can smear themselves over the tarmac as much as they like.