Canadian Association of Journalists Support Aylmer Express Journalists
The London Free Press has reported that the Canadian Association of Journalists is condemning the Ontario Provincial Police for their actions in charging two Aylmer Express journalists with respect to an incident that occurred in June of 2017 involving the death of a driver who drove his vehicle over a cliff of Lake Erie. The circumstances as to how and why the incident occurred was not clear as reports of the OPP involvement in a pursuit of the deceased’s vehicle were confusing, at best. The two charged journalists, John Hueston, and his son, Brett, were involved in some kind of verbal altercation with police when they tried to take photographs near the site where the plunge took place. It is likely that a trial, reportedly commencing on Wednesday, June 27th, will provide some clarification as to why charges against the two were necessary. The summary of the incident as reported by the London Free Press, suggested that the police actions were excessive and unnecessary.
The issue has been raised on numerous occasions involving police actions. A full, detailed and independent assessment of police actions is often unavailable to the public. The involvement of independent journalists who can provide an objective assessment of police actions has been a fundamental cornerstone of western democracy. It cannot be overstated that when issues of significant importance to society need to be illuminated there has to be an independent voice to present that view.
At the time of the incident Gorski Consulting had also expressed concern over the confusing report of how the driver came to his death. A news article was prepared summarizing the inconsistencies in that information. Subsequently that news article has now been uploaded to the Articles page of this Gorski Consulting website.
Highway 401 Median Cross-over Fatal Collision Near Chatham Ontario
A high-tension cable barrier will be installed along the 119 kilometer stretch of Highway 401 between Tilbury and London, Ontario. This decision has already been made and construction is already underway. Its effectiveness however will remain questionable on a highway that contains so many large and heavy trucks. Just this past week, on June 22, 2018, a tractor trailer travelled through the median and collided with another truck resulting in fatal injuries to one of the truck drivers. It has not been definitively proven that the proposed high tension cable barrier will prevent such a collision from occurring. A cable can gain its strength of its length while being anchored at many locations and providing some level of deflection. However many loaded tractor trailers could weight as much as 80,000 pounds. Deflecting such a large mass may prove challenging when the truck’s angle of departure increases. Also, as has been proven in many instances, relatively minor impacts to installations are often left unrepaired and over time the initial strength of such a system becomes weakened.
There is little or no independent supervision of the agencies that provide maintenance to the systems. Police whose duty it should be to protect the public from all highway hazards, regardless of their origin, simply do not understand that their duty must include the protection of the public from hazards caused by roadway deficiencies.
There are many concerns with respect to the reporting of the results median cross-over collisions. The public that is expected to elect their political representatives must have a clear understanding of the safety issues so that they can inform their political representatives of what they expect. When the public is uninformed it makes the wrong requests. Thus a proper degree of public information about how highway systems are performing is essential.
Charges Against Aylmer Express Newspaper Journalists An Appalling Abuse of Democracy
For years Gorski Consulting has expressed the opinion that the public needs to be made aware of the manner in which persons have perished in motor vehicle incidents. It has been our continual criticism that investigating police do not provide sufficient information about those deaths and the mainstream news media are often handicapped with the lack of funds to provide quality journalism that digs deeper than what they are simply told to report by police.
Over the years we have been impressed with the quality of reporting by the very small Aylmer Express newspaper located in Aylmer, Ontario. On a number of occasions, when the large mainstream organizations did not provide sufficient detail surrounding a motor vehicle collision, we found that the Aylmer Express filled in those details. We often wondered how such a small outfit could provide such quality journalism that the larger outfits could not.
It is with great distress that we have learned that these high-quality journalists have been charged with respect to the high-quality activities that they have engaged in by attempting to obtain information about how a driver came to his death upon driving over a cliff of Lake Erie on June 23, 2017, not too far from Aylmer, Ontario.
In fact, Gorski Consulting was also concerned about the reported information about the death such that we prepared an article on the incident and posted the article on our Articles page of this website. The circumstances by which the death was reported did not make sense and we totally understand why the Aylmer Express journalists would seek to attend the site where the driver perished to learn whether the police were involved in a chase that ultimately led to the driver’s death.
It was only through the actions of the London Free Press that published an article in their digital website that we learned of the charges to these journalists. Without that action no one would have known that these charges took place. We understand that every incident has its divergent reporting of facts. However the London Free Press article was disturbing in the way it reported the police actions that appeared to be highly inappropriate. The journalists, John Hueston, publisher, and his son Brett, apparently crossed over a road-closed sign on the roadway to get closer to the collision site where the driver perished. While taking photos of the recovery operations they were reportedly approached by a plain-clothed female offer and subsequently by her superior, that, through a verbal exchange, led the journalists to be charged with “criminal obstruction of a police officer”. Again, the facts as reported by the London Free Press may be different than reality and the true facts may be revealed in court. However, if the facts are as reported, they truly represent a challenge to democracy and the freedom of the press which is so vital to it.
What is at stake at the upcoming trial that will commence in St. Thomas, Ontario on June 27, 2018, is not just the damaging of the reputations of these high-quality journalists. What is at stake is the fundamental right of the public to be provided with independent information about the “5 Ws” of any incident (Who, What, Where, When and How, or something to that effect). Independent reporting beyond what the public is told by the government, its police, or other agencies in charge, has long been crucial to the ideals of democracy that guarantee a balancing of power. The tipping of that important balance can lead to far more unpleasant outcomes than the result of a simple trial.
We will be watching closely for the result of that trial. But more importantly, we emphasize the importance of freedom of expression and the absolute necessity that the public be informed of important matters that the public has a right to know. When the public is simply told what it is to know this is a recipe for disaster. Independent journalism is absolutely essential to our stable and secure way of life that we have enjoyed for many generations.
Highway 401 Rear-End Impact of Stopped Vehicle Could Have Been Fatal
While it looks worse,this rear-impacted vehicle could easily have resulted in fatal injuries.
Being stopped on Highway 401 is a recipe for disaster and was demonstrated once again in a collision that occurred near Kenesserie Road on Monday morning, June 11, 2018, just east of Chatham, Ontario.
It was reported that the above-pictured vehicle had come to a stop as a result of another collision that occurred earlier. A transport truck coming from behind failed to stop and struck the vehicle pushing it into the median. One need not be an expert to recognize that the extent of crush was such that fatal injuries could easily have occurred. Setting that aside however the lack of major injuries is also not as surprising as one might think.
Looking at the back bumper and right rear wheel it can be seen that these structures were not crushed forward to the extent of the structures above. It is well-known in the collision reconstruction community that the stiffness of passenger vehicles lies at the bumper level and when there is “over-ride” damage from impacts by taller vehicles such as transport trucks, there is a lot of energy dissipation that occurs in the softer structure (sheet metal, etc) resulting in a lot of crush and structural intrusion into the occupant space. Normally structural intrusion is very bad. But in this case there was likely no one in the vehicle except the driver and it can been that the structural intrusion was not as significant at the driver’s seat (even though the angle of the photograph tends to hide that fact). So in this exceptional case, it was advantageous to have the tremendous extent of deformation and crush as this would increase the collision time and thus reduce the acceleration which causes injury. What may not be apparent is that if the car’s structure was extremely stiff and did on crush then the struck vehicle would be accelerated forward in a much faster time and this would increase the acceleration experienced by the struck driver. Never-the-less, it was a lucky occurrence that, even via a minor adjustment to the circumstances, could easily have resulted in fatal injuries to this driver.
At the same time as this incident was being reported, CTV News published an article using OPP statistics indicating that “Fatal transport truck crashes up 25 per cent” over the previous year. As is typical of such inflammatory pronouncements they did not actually tell anyone what the numbers were. So, as an example, if there were two fatal collisions last year, and four collisions this year that would be a 100 per cent increase. But does that mean that we should become hysterical about these numbers? Clearly this could be normal, typical, fluctuation of collision numbers.
As typical the partnership of the OPP with the CTV article places most of the blame for transport truck crashes on truck drivers. In reality, OPP investigations are not as complete or accurate to allow such a broad generalization. In most of the investigations we have examined in the past glaring errors exist such that the facts and analysis gathered from such collisions rarely provide a correct indication of the causes. While driver error cannot be discounted, a properly detailed investigation and analysis often reveals that the causes are far more complicated.
Rear-end impacts on Highway 401 are a typical example of the dangerous events that occur without properly detailed accounting of the factors that lead to them. It requires that the purpose of investigation be adjusted not just to punish drivers, but to scientifically document and analyze incidents to make all users of the highway safe from all potential hazards.
Roadway Factors in Fatal Tour Bus Crash on Highway 401
While the typical discussion of news media centred around irrelevant issues, the important questions regarding how and why a tour bus of Chinese passengers sideswiped a rock cut on the side of Highway 401 near Prescott, Ontario were never asked and therefore no answers were given.
It was Monday afternoon, June 4, 2018 when reports began coming in of a serious bus crash involving multiple injured passengers on Highway 401 near Prescott, Ontario. As the reports continued it was revealed that at least 5 passengers sustained critical level injuries and, as of the present time, one of those passengers has now been declared deceased.
As is typical in such matters police closed the roadway where the collision took place and this resulted in news media scrambling to take long-distance and aerial photos of the bus. In the vast majority of these instances the critical evidence of importance is often located along the travel path of the vehicle leading up to the final rest position of the vehicle. Yet, in almost every circumstance all the news media flock to taking photos and video of the damaged vehicle without documenting the important evidence that might reveal how and why the collision occurred. The critical evidence would lie within the last 200 or 300 metres of roadway east of where the bus came to rest so that we could identify important clues such as tire marks, debris, or characteristics of the road.
Even through there were only poor views of the area there were still areas of concern that were revealed. Primarily a rock cut existed close to the road and there was no evidence of a guardrail or any other device placed along this major expressway that would keep high speed traffic protected from travelling into the rock cut. Secondly, the steepness of the slope of the roadside appeared to be excessive thus taking any wayward vehicle toward the rock cut. Thirdly, there were road maintenance pylons visible along the side of the highway suggesting there was some work in progress that might have been a factor causing the bus to veer off of the roadway. Fourth, there appeared to be a new patch in the road surface a short distance from where the bus came to rest and along the median edge of the road surface. Such evidence could suggest that other patches existed or surface deficiencies existed that had not yet been repaired. None of these important facts were discussed in any of the news media coverage of the tragedy. Undoubtedly, as typically happens, a police spokesperson will stand before a news camera and will proclaim that an investigation is under way and it is too early to say anything of relevance, and the matter will float away from the public’s memory until the next tragedy occurs.
An interesting sideline is that the Mayor the Town of Prescott was actually interviewed and expressed his concern over the number of serious collisions that have occurred recently in area of the bus crash. Mayor Brett Todd referred to two serious tractor-trailer crashes that had occurred on Highway 401 and he complained of the highway being reduced to a single lane of traffic: “Whenever you have a reduction in lanes, it seems that we have these serious accidents”. In fact that is a wise observation coming from a non-expert that could have been made by anyone. But no one has made that comment, or least such a comment was never brought to the public’s attention.
In fact, many safety problems exist when lane closures take place in the presence of a large percentage of heavy truck on Highway 401. This is a simple conclusion that could be made by anyone. While protest groups have called for median barriers to be placed in areas such as at the Chatham- Kent area, no one has really stopped to ask how many serious collisions are occurring when there are lane closures and heavy trucks are involved. Median barriers are important safety improvements but there are many other safety concerns that also need to be highlighted.
So what happened with the tour bus collision near Prescott? Why did it veer off the road? News media immediately focused on the driver of the bus, the bus tour company and the possibility of a defect in the bus. However any collision analyst would understand that, historically, collision investigations need to focus on three general factors: Human, Vehicle and Environment, or HVE. This has been understood for decades by safety researchers. So where is the focus on the last factor, the Environment? Seemingly, in the psyche of police and news media the Environment factor does not exist and therefore it is never in the minds of the public that obtains all its information about collisions from these monopolies of collision information.
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