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Lane Splitter T-Bones Car Turning Right in Traffic

Now that California officially adopted lane splitting as a legal practice, here’s another thing you need to consider along with California Highway Patrol’s guide in order to stay alive in the crazy rush hour traffic.
Lane splitter T-bones car 1 photo
Photo: screenshot from YouTube
CHP is soon to post their official lane splitting guide, and our guess is that it will pretty much be the same with its previous advice from the past - don’t lane split 15 mph more than the speed of traffic and don’t do it at all over 50 mph. Which is reasonable for a sane rider, but their guide should also include some advice regarding traffic patterns.

For example, if you’re lane splitting and see an abnormal space between two cars in one lane at rush hour be almost sure that a vehicle will want to use that space as soon as possible. Just as it happened in this video here from Australia.

The incident was captured on film by a dashboard camera of a car sitting in traffic. A motorcycle splits the lanes on the right side at a reasonable speed, but two car lengths ahead there’s a gap and through it a car pops out perpendicularly as it was turning right from the incoming lane and other cars let it pass through.

Of course, the driver turning right through packed traffic didn’t check for motorcycles splitting through and jumped right in front of one, getting T-boned right in the B-pillar area. Luckily, the speed at which this happened wasn’t big, and it looks like both escaped alive.

So, next time you’re lane splitting, make sure you do it at a speed you can stop from in time to avoid a collision. Also, keep your eyes peeled for traffic gaps because sooner or later a car would like to occupy it. Cars changing lanes without signaling and doors opening in your path are another reason to continuously scan your surroundings.

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