Keeping a safe distance from the car ahead is one of the most important road safety rules. If two cars are driving on a road without much distance between them and the lead driver applies the brakes, the driver behind would not get enough time and would end up colliding with the other car. This is because the car travels some distance before coming to a complete stop even after the brakes are applied.
Therefore, in order to avoid collisions, you should maintain some distance between your car and the car ahead. There is no definite figure for it, but there are some rules that ensure you are at an appropriate distance according to the situation. This guide will help you understand those rules.
Calculating Safe Following Distance
If you look up the rules regarding safe following distance, you will find that they will mention that your car needs to have a particular distance at minimum from the other car. But how can you estimate this distance between your car and the other one? Let’s take a look at how you can calculate the safe following distance.
The rule of thumb is to keep a full two seconds of space from the car in front of you. This is known as the two-second rule.
However, in poor conditions such as foggy weather or rough road surfaces, you need to keep more distance than mentioned above because they increase the braking distance of vehicles. On roads with trucks or trailers, maintaining a safe following distance is one of the best ways to safely drive around heavy vehicles. Here’s how the two-second rule works:
- Choose any object on the road like a road sign or a pole.
- When the leading vehicle passes the object you have chosen, start counting ‘’one thousand and one, one thousand and two’ in your head.
- ‘’One thousand and one, one thousand and two’ are eight words in total. If you pass the object you have chosen before you finish the count, you are not abiding by the safe following distance rule.
- To ensure that you have increased that distance to 2 seconds, you can pick another object and repeat the procedure.
Similarly, there is also 3 second rule of driving where you have to count “one thousand and one, one thousand and two, one thousand and three” and rest of the procedure remains the same. As discussed above, the tougher the conditions are for driving, the minimum safe following distance increases.
How Adaptive Cruise Control Can Help You to Follow Safe Following Distance?
Oftentimes, it is not that easy to measure the safe following distance. This is made easier by adaptive cruise control in cars. Adaptive cruise control uses sensory technology to calculate your car’s speed with relation to other vehicles and increases or decreases it accordingly. You can turn on the adaptive cruise control from the left side of steering wheel. Below, we have put together a list of some cars which use adaptive cruise control:
- 2021 BMW 3 Series
- 2020 Volvo S60
- 2021 Nissan Altima
- 2019 Kia Soul
Importance of Safe Following Distance in the UAE
Drivers are expected to know the safe following distance because this is one of the factors assessed during the driving tests. When applicants reach the stage of road tests, instructor tests whether they are able to follow the safe following distance. The distance varies depending upon the type of vehicle with safe following distance for heavy vehicles being more than safe following distance for cars. Those who do not abide by the safe following distance rule do what is known as tailgating. One of the common reasons why drivers tailgate is road rage or that they want the lead driver to speed up.
If you find yourself in a similar situation, you can either report the driver or let him pass by. In UAE, drivers charged with tailgating can face a fine of AED 400 and receive four traffic points.
Tailgating significantly increases the likelihood of rear-end collisions. If your car has been severely damaged by a tailgating driver, you can browse through this huge collection of used cars for sale in the UAE. For more information related to automobiles and the automotive industry, stay tuned to UAE’s leading auto blog.
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