SINGAPORE - In the span of three days, two separate videos have emerged online of cars getting hit by larger vehicles while trying to switch lanes and cut in front of them.
The first was posted on the Facebook page of road safety interest group roads.sg on Tuesday (Jan 10), and happened in front of Fragrance Empire Building along Alexandra Road.
The dashcam footage showed a red Kia trying to cut from the left-most lane, into the lane on its right. However, the long trailer in the next lane did not see it coming, and continued driving anyway instead of giving way.
The car was dragged forward for about 2m before the trailer stopped.
Another video on Thursday, also on the roads.sg Facebook page, showed a silver car trying to cut from the middle lane of a three-lane road to the right-most lane.
The incident happened along West Coast Road, at the T-junction outside Commonwealth Secondary School, where drivers can turn right to Jurong Town Hall Road.
From the video, which was captured from the rear-view camera of a car in front, the silver Toyota could be seen inching into the lane with his signal on, but the green truck drove on, presumably unable to see the car, since the carriage is quite high.
This caused the two vehicles to brush into each other.
Mr Dave Ng, chairman of the Singapore Transport Association, told The Straits Times: "Many a times, car drivers neglect to realise that heavy vehicles have a larger blind spot on both sides.
"They assume that the truck drivers are able to see everyone on the road, because they sit higher above the ground."
To decrease the risk of such accidents, he advised car drivers against cutting in front of heavy vehicles, as there is a bigger blind spot there.
"Avoid lingering alongside the heavy vehicle for too long, as the car is at the heavy vehicle's blind spot zone too," he added.
Mr Ng stressed the need to pay attention to the heavy vehicle's brake lights when following behind, and that tailgating is a no-no as it limits the car driver's visibility and reaction time.
