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Each time another driver does something that can put your safety at risk, there should always be a proactive reaction to their action. This is especially true when being followed too closely or tailgated.
Tailgating has become a huge problem on our roads and leads to many collisions every day. There are solutions to help those who tailgate, but they haven’t exactly embraced those ideas and changed their ways. So, it’s up to us to change how we drive to protect ourselves from these types of drivers.
Let’s start with the risks associated with being tailgated. The moment you need to brake remotely hard, the driver following you closely from behind wouldn’t have enough time to see your brake lights, move their foot from the gas to the brake, and stop their vehicle. This lack of time causes you to get struck from behind and any rear-seat passenger in your vehicle has a high percentage of being injured. Here’s what you can do.
Once you realize you’re being tailgated, ease off the accelerator to increase your following distance. After that, ensure you match the speed of the traffic ahead of you in your lane. You’re not moving any slower than the vehicle ahead of you, you just have a larger following distance. If the driver ahead of you now brakes hard, because of the larger distance between your vehicle and their vehicle, you would not need to brake as hard to stop your vehicle. If you don’t need to brake as hard, the driver behind you doesn’t need to either, giving them more time to stop.
Always look ahead and anticipate what the traffic is doing. If you see brake lights well ahead, begin slowing down early and gently. You know you’ll need to brake, braking early helps control your vehicle and the tailgater behind you because you’ll be braking more gradually. The brake lights of your vehicle can help alert the driver behind you to respond early.
You could also change lanes to avoid having the driver tailgate you. If you can’t change lanes because there are no opportunities to do so, or if you’re in the lane you need to be in to reach your destination, you could slow down and pull to the side of the road and stop. This would often cause the driver behind to drive around you. Now the problem of the tailgater is gone.
Rear crashes don’t have to happen if you act smart and proactive. That’s what good drivers do.