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Comment by trabant00 | Hacker News Reader

> clearly the cause of the crash here isn't the tesla, it is other cars not respecting minimum safety distances

The cause of the crash is the Tesla. You are not allowed to stop on bridges, in tunnels and several other places. The crashes starting with the Nth car and not the 1st is normal. Reaction time of the first car eats into the reaction of the second and so on until there's no more time to stop. Understand that cars further back do not see the car in front of them applying the brakes and slowing down, they are seeing a car moving at normal speed instantly crashing. Minimum safety distance is not as big as reaction time plus stopping to zero, that would be huge.

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Not sure I understand your reasoning. The further you are from the first car, the more warning you get on what's going on, not the other way round. I typically watch not just the car in front of me but 1 or 2 cars ahead. If I see those cars braking, I start breaking. It's the car immediately following the tesla that got the least warning.

It is not always possible to see 1 or 2 cars ahead, that can not be the standard for who is at fault.

edit: to make it clear, we are debating whether the Tesla is at fault, not whether the other could have avoided it. Creating a dangerous situation still puts you at fault, you can not be allowed to do so at any time on the grounds that everybody else should avoid you.

And yet, I make it a point to achieve enough space for reaction time + stopping to zero as often as possible. Everyone should.

Good for you. It is not always possible thought and this is why we have laws against braking or driving at significant lower speeds for no reason.

Creating a dangerous situation is not acceptable on the grounds that other drivers should be able to avoid it.

Wouldn't "acquire acceptable safety distance" be a reason good enough?

also, since they don't expect the need to come to a full stop, they don't apply enough braking force.

It's not illegal to stop on a bridge or tunnel if required to not crash, surely?

Of course not, but the Tesla was not about to crash, so I don't understand your point.

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