This the Worst Thing You Can Do When Trying to Avoid a Crash in Rain

Sadly for ourselves and those around us as well, we're thrown out in the world and left on our own to learn all the rest. Some people catch up more quickly, others go to their graves without ever becoming at least decent drivers, but having covered millions of miles nevertheless.

When the road is covered in snow, everybody - well, almost everybody - is aware of the lower grip and the danger it poses, so they lower the speed and drive more carefully. In the wet, however, things don't appear to be so drastic, so you'll see plenty of drivers behave just as if the sun was up.

Lower speed and a greater gap between the car in front are just two of the most fundamental measures anyone can get. And then you should also consider that not all road surfaces are created equal. The standard tarmac will offer decent grip as long as it's not covered in water - at which point aquaplaning becomes a real possibility.

Streetcar tracks, however, become as slippery as black ice, so braking with your wheels on them will turn your car into a sled. Equally dangerous is the cobblestone, which is probably why it's been removed from almost everywhere. Well, that and the fact it tended to mess with the car's suspension and steering systems.

The driver in this video makes themselves guilty of all of the above. They don't slow down, they don't keep a safe distance and, when they enter the cobblestone segment, they don't take any measures. What's more, they don't seem to pay that much attention to the traffic either.

The clip has been uploaded with the title "slowest reaction time ever," but we think that's not what's going on. Actually, we believe there could be two explanations: the first is that the driver simply has no reaction whatsoever because they were doing something completely different.

The second is a bit more complex, and involves another piece of skill that nobody tells you about during driving school. The driver of the SUV in front knows about it, so they were able to save themselves.

You can see the vehicle brake as the white sedan enters their lane. Since there was no time for the car to stop, particularly not in the rain, they let go of the brakes to regain traction and goes around. Had the driver tried to swerve while pushing the brake pedal, the car would have continued to slide into the sedan.

We suspect that's what happened with the dashcam. In situations such as this where you need to make split-second decisions, you can go wrong even if, in theory, you know what needs to be done. If you lack the knowledge as well as the cool-headedness, then... you're screwed.