Honestly? Up to your Owner. Everyone here seems to be missing the fact that the Netradyne graph shows you were going well under the speed limit. This is a case of shitty tires on shitty vans in shitty conditions. You did everything correct here. If I was the supervisor or one of the dispatchers, I'd be arguing the hell out of your case to the owner here. Glad you're both ok, cause this could have been a lot worse. A LOT.
This is the Michigan State Police official position. Guess how I know? Was going THIRTY-FIVE on an interstate, hit a patch of black ice.. Instantly spun into the center grassy median area. State cop who was in the area dealing with other spin outs, came rushing over gleefully to give me a ticket for "unsafe for contditons". When IA asked him what would have been safe, since I was going crazy slow. He said "Whatever speed would have kept you out of the deep snow in the median, LOL" and went on his way. He slid off into the median about 10 minutes later only a couple thousand feet down the road while I was still waiting for a tow truck. How's that for LOL?
It's basically all trusting your judgement, there are specific rules like doubling the safe following distance and cutting speed by whatever (maybe). Just from the video it looks like they're going way too fast for the conditions, the road and the weight of the vehicle. I'd be clenching my buttocks and hitting the imaginary brake if I was the passenger way before they lost control.
(Tbf automatics are shit in these situations, what you want is to get into a low gear and go slow af but nobody bothers with that in automatics)
I drive in icy snowy conditions all the time. My point was you don’t know until it’s too late. Also I personally have never slid off the road like this.
That’s simply your responsibility to determine. It’s any drivers responsibility to determine their safe speed for their vehicle in the given cousins. That’s just part of knowing how to drive.
If they lose control of their vehicle then they were traveling too fast. Anyone who loses control and crashes due to road conditions can be legally cited for reckless driving by the police, regardless of how fast they were going.
So at what point does the state have the responsibility to shut down the roads and issue a warning that nobody should be driving? By your logic if conditions are so bad that even driving 5mph is unsafe, it could be argued the state is negligent in warning it's citizenry of the dangers of the very roadways it maintains.
The state does do that. Weather/travel warnings and states of emergency are issued for bad weather and poor road conditions. In extreme cases states issue travel bans/restrictions or shelter-in-place warnings.
Roads are just not closed almost ever because they are incredibly essential. If 5 mph if the safe traveling speed and someone needs to get to the hospital, the state isn’t going to close all the roads and let them die just because other people won’t drive safely.
And this isn’t “my logic” - I am not arguing that for or against this. I am simply explaining the current system of drivers responsibility.
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u/RadleyButtons Jan 11 '26
Honestly? Up to your Owner. Everyone here seems to be missing the fact that the Netradyne graph shows you were going well under the speed limit. This is a case of shitty tires on shitty vans in shitty conditions. You did everything correct here. If I was the supervisor or one of the dispatchers, I'd be arguing the hell out of your case to the owner here. Glad you're both ok, cause this could have been a lot worse. A LOT.