To be shocked at what’s just happened on the school run

[Molyka88]

So today after picking DCs up from school/nursery a car that was parked up close behind my car put their car into accelerate instead of reverse and ended up pinning me between my rear bumper and their front bumper whilst I was putting bags etc in the boot.

Mum in question did not realise one of my legs was taking the brunt of this until I was shouting to tell her to reverse.
She did apologise at the time, but didn’t get out of the car to ask if I was ok or anything like that!

I’ve got home now and my knee already is swollen and starting to bruise.. I’m also thinking this could have been a much worse accident if this was DS stood in between the car.

Fortunately a parent came over to check if I was ok and he did catch the incident on his dash cam.
So would you put this down as an unfortunate accident or do anything about it? I’m not even sure who or if I would report it too.

First of all try to get the footage, report it to the police and her insurance company.
Get yourself checked privately and quickly incase you haven’t damaged anything.
Her insurance should cover it.

If it was a bloke driving I can’t believe these posters would be saying to leave it. “ bless him, he was probably in shock it’s just an accident”. Having a vagina doesn’t give you authority to disregard the basic principals of road safety or eliminate the need to comply with the law.

Similar happened to my husband, he was walking our son who was about 4 to school and one of the Mum's who always parks on the corner where you're not meant to park reversed into them. My husband pushed our son out of the way and she hit my husband's leg. She drove off without noticing. We reported it to the school as I had already complained several times about dangerous parking outside the school (not just this woman but others too) and they did nothing.

@MrPickles73

What were you hoping the school would do ? . If you’d reported it to the police they might have sent some officers / PCSOs at school drop off / pick up times in addition to speaking to the driver.

Divebar2021 they should have asked the police to pop by every now and then to enforce the zigzag outside the school rather than letting every dumb parent and member of staff park on it. About a month after my husband was hit a 3 year old was narrowly missed on the pavement when a parent mounted the pavement to park on the zigzag. I'm all for accident prevention rather than waiting for a fatality.. call me picky..

@rwalker

She wasn't aware and you made her aware .You walked over to her she apologised . I'm assuming you didn't say anything else so the woman presumed it was dealt with . This is not a hit and run .

This is completely incorrect!

If shitty driver hasn't reported herself to the police then she's committed an offence.

You cannot be in collision with a pedestrian and not either provide your insurance and driver details or report it to the police.

Doing neither is an offence. No ifs, no buts.

Don't bother contacting school. They would not be allowed to give out contact details. GDPR

I hope your knees are ok and have been checked. I crashed my motorbike when I was young, it slid on a patch of black ice. Suspected fractured knees at the time. Now I’m older my left knee creaks and gets a bit achey in cold weather.

A child was crushed between vehicles when I was still at school in a similar incident though one of the vehicles was a much larger lorry, their sibling was in my year group. She was left with serious life long disabilities including brain damage.

I can understand that everyone was in shock at the time but she should have given you her details.

The most important thing is that you go and get your injuries looked at ASAP. Then I think contact your car insurer. They will be able to follow it all up for you. Let them know the reg number of the other car if you know it or can find it out from the dash cam video.

Hope you are ok, try not to torture yourself with what-ifs. Accidents happen.

This happened near me a few years ago in a school car park. A child died.

You MUST report this to the police.

If this were our school they would 100% mention in our weekly newsletter there had been an incident with dangerous driving at pick up and warn parents that any such incident will be reported to school/police so drivers should be extra vigilant when parking/collecting kids etc.

Not to the same extent but I have had similar.

Cars often illegally pulled up/parked outside the school, there are car parks within easy walking distance but parents would rather pull up in unsafe places and its been a nusence for years, the school repetetively told them to stop, council tried ticketing people and eventually moved the entrance to the school to the otherside of the building away from the road.

I use to walk my DS to school and one day while crossing the road outside the school a mother flung her car into reverse without looking, luckily I pushed DS out of the way but she hit me (Im 5 foot 7 and was wearing bright pink, if she hadnt seen me theres no way she could see the the 4-11 year olds crossing - its a padestrian crossing by the way).

She looked up to see what she hit litrally made eye contact with me then just shrugged and drove off like nothing happened. I wasnt really injured (just hit my shins knocked backwards and regained myself before going over).

I should have reported her for hit and run, if it had been one of the small children she would have completely knocked them over and could have killed them since she clearly wouldnt have seen them and didnt even get out to check before carrying on and without conciquences people dont learn.

It never ceases to amaze me how little thought people give to their dangerous behavior - did the woman that hit you get out to help etc... or only other people?

Yoi absolutely must report this.

Extremely dangerous and negligent.

I remeber reading about exactly this happening in a school in South London last year. Several children were injured. Some life changing injuries. Was in the news.

Her lack of care and safety particularly around a school needs to be formally addressed asap .

By which I mean you need to report to the police.

Hope you have now reported this to the police. It's nothing to do with the school incidentally.

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/breaking-earlsfield-incident-children-parents-22649760.amp

Report to police.

If it had been a child rather than your legs that were pinned it wouldn't be a question re what to do.

Thank god it wasn't, don't ignore this as next time it could be .

Hope your knee is ok and that you’ve reported this to the police

This is so serious. Could have been fatal, and still may cause long term issues for you. I hope you're being checked out and I hope you do report to the police.

@poppycat10

an apology is also an admission of guilt

no it isn't

Why else apologise unless you're in the wrong, (which she blatantly was.) This solicitor also says the same coodes.co.uk/blog/should-i-expect-an-apology-if-im-injured-in-a-road-accident/

I just BET she'd had a drink.

@MsTSwift

Jesus. Some of the responses do make me slightly nervous to leave the house?! The minimising of frankly dangerous cavalier driving and then not giving a shit who you hurt as long as your own schedule is not disrupted by one minute is sobering (and quite depressing)

I entirely agree.

But the people who are minimising are the same people who think that their car insurance premium is more important to protect than someone's leg.

And if someone gets hit, don't engage them. Don't do anything that could admit guilt. Just shrug, apologise quickly and drive away before the legal act of giving details takes place.

Because, insurance premiums.

@FortunesFave

I just BET she'd had a drink.

It would explain a lot.

This happened to a relative, she drove home then realised she couldn't get out of the car - she had broken bones in both legs . Please do get checked medically as well as report to police.

Ask The Police website - the official police resource for England and Wales - says this about being involved in a road traffic accident - which is what this is.

"If, as a driver, your vehicle is involved in a road-traffic accident/collision on a road or public place and one or more of the following occurs:

a person, other than yourself, is injured,
damage is caused to another vehicle or to someone else's property - including street lamps, signs, bollards etc.
an animal, other than one in your own vehicle/trailer, has been killed or injured (animal means any horse, cattle, ass, mule, sheep, pig, goat or dog).
YOU MUST:

stop (whether it's your fault or not) AND,
give your name and address, the vehicle owner's name and address and your vehicle's registration number to anyone with reasonable grounds for asking for those details.
If you don't give your name and address, you must report the accident at a police station or to a police constable as soon as you can, and in any case within 24 hours (this does not mean you have 24 hours in which to report the accident). If you fail to stop, fail to give your and the owner's name and address or the vehicle's details or fail to report the accident, you commit an offence/s.

If another person is injured, in addition to the above, YOU MUST:

Produce your certificate of insurance to a constable or anyone else having reasonable grounds to see it.
If you don't, you must report the accident at a police station or to a constable as soon as you can and in any case within 24 hours (this does not mean you have 24 hours in which to report the accident) and produce your certificate of insurance. However, if you don't have your certificate with you when you report the accident to the police, you can take it, within seven days of the accident, to the police station you nominate when you report the incident.

Points to note:

Reporting – if you are under a legal responsibility to tell the police about an accident you cannot do this by telephone, you can only report an accident at a police station or to a police officer in person.
Driving – you're legally obliged to comply with these requirements not only when you are directly involved in an accident, but also if your vehicle's 'presence' was a factor in an accident. You don't even have to have been driving the vehicle at the time of the accident e.g. you park your car and run to post a letter, your car runs downhill and collides with another.
The above provisions make no reference to blame. Therefore, a driver must comply with them even if they are not at fault for the accident."

It seems pretty clear from this that the woman committed an offence when she left the scene of the accident without reporting it or giving her details. I doubt she would have reported it later on, because that would involve admitting that she did not have the details for the woman she hit - and that would NOT be an admission she'd want to make to the police!