It's a car one - with diagram!

[Sandydonut]

NC just in case and AIBU for traffic. This has already been swiftly sorted out, but I'm curious for opinions on what happened.

Winding, wooded, country A road, line of cars all doing about 40.

About 30 yards ahead van goes fully into oncoming lane and and pauses.

Road at this point curves around a bend to the right. Road markings are long dashes with arrows to stop overtaking from oncoming direction.

Van turns left, fully across, at right angles, left lane to go into private side road on left.

Car hits van in centre of its body.

1. The private road entrance and width all the way is enough for more than two cars.
2. The road was a bend at this point, so while in oncoming lane, cars could have hit van.
3. The corner was not that sharp. If the van had slowed almost to a stop in its own lane and turned left, it would have made it without even swinging out into the oncoming lane, let alone putting 100% of itself over there.

What do you think? Diagram attached. If you want to vote, say YABU for Van being in the right, YANBU for Van being in the wrong.

Give way to what? The person undertaking him? 😂
In the nicest possible way, I hope you’ve misunderstood the scenario or aren’t a driver 🙂

I'd go 50:50. 75:25 if the van driver was found to be executing a dangerous manoeuvre.

@Howdoesitworkagain well it sounds like he had driven over to the opposite side of the road. Parked. Then drove back across into oncoming traffic. If he had done this as one continuous movement then yes the car should have slowed/stopped. But if he stopped then yes he needs to check for oncoming traffic before setting off again.

But maybe I'm reading it wrong?

I'm guessing from the tone of your posts OP that you are the car driver?

I'm going out on a limb and guessing the line of cars had been sat behind the camper van for some time, the first car driver (you?) got impatient and when the van moved right you took the opportunity to undertake without thinking about where the van might have been going.

Entirely your fault!!

You don't undertake, even if the van pulled over to the right you should have been patient and waited to see what it was doing.

The van was on the wrong side of the road, if they then decided they needed to turn left they don't have "right of way" just because it MAY have put its indicator on. You can't just drive into the side of a car because you're making a manoeuvre and tell them it's their fault

The car drove into the side of the van, not the other way around.

That would be different if he’d parked, I didn’t read it as he’d parked though. Surely if there was time to consider him “parked” there would have been even more thinking/stopping time for the cars.

Van the size of a campervan

Possibly a van carrying horses then? Would probably have needed to swing out wide and let the van settle before pulling on to a smaller road, most likely littered with pot holes.

100% car driver at fault.

The car is at fault and should at the very least, have predicted van like driving so should have stayed back and waited for van to finish whatever idiotic manoeuvre he was trying to do.

Op are you the car driver trying to justify your dangerous manoeuvre? Or were you a passenger in it? You don’t say which vehicle you were in or if if you were just a witness to it so i’ll go with you being at fault & now trying to cover your tracks?

Do you have any independent witnesses or dash cam footage to confirm your version of what happened as it’s only your word that van driver stopped (or paused?) in the oncoming lane & that he wasn’t indicating either. If you saw him
move into the oncoming lane (he’s lucky no oncoming collision) you should have slowed down and anticipated him realising his error and swinging back in as there is no right hand turn there or waited to see what manoeuvre he was trying to do.

If he was indicating left you should have realised he had to swing wide due to his size to make the turn especially if it was a tight or angled one. If he briefly swung right when the road was clear and then turned left without delaying he hasn’t really did anything that is dangerous in order to. You were either not paying enough attention or going too fast as if you had slowed down to see what he was doing and not tried to undertake him (which you shouldn’t do anyway) you wouldn’t have hit him. Do you also drive a small car with no idea of dimensions and making turns in bigger vehicles?

Regardless of how he got there he was mid turn when you hit him & as it’s square on thats what he’ll argue - that he was already turning and car driver at fault. You could try for 50/50 as insurance always say never admit liability but if i was the van driver i wouldn’t accept that & would argue for non fault especially if i had dash cam footage (i’m assuming you know he hasn’t & neither have you) but i do think even if the van was doing something he shouldn’t have been which was potentially dangerous as the car driver you had time to avoid a collision and didn’t so you are still at fault

I think it all comes down to whether the van was indicating.
If he just pulled into the on coming lane and paused, it is reasonable to assume he was either stopping there for some reason (like delivery drivers do) or that he was turning into somewhere on the right (not everyone will have been familiar with the road layout).

If he was indicating left, he should have been slowing right down and completed the left hand turn in a single manouvre.

It's a good thing they didn't drive into the side of a car then

Both are at fault.

The van for doing a strange move, but the car should have also come to a stop, or at least slowed down considering that a larger vehicle was doing an unexpected manoeuvre.

Car in the wrong. Did he think the van was going to park in the middle of the wrong side of the road? The car should have stopped and waited to see what the van was doing. I would assume the vans wheels were turned towards the entrance he was going to pull into.

I think the OP must be the car driver, because she's not coming back

Car is at fault. It hit the vehicle in front. The fact it took a wide turn is irrelevant.

Wow I must make illegal moves every time I'm towing at work because the private lane to the house is too tight unless you use both lanes to turn. And there's a whopping big ditch on the left hand side waiting for you if you judge it wrong.

They’ve obviously never seen a large lorry pull out (legally) from a junction either as per the highway code 🙈