A motorhome towing a caravan has nearly completely overturned on Queensland’s Bruce Highway as a nightmare period of towing accidents continues.
In the yesterday’s crash near Tiaro, several people had to be rescued through their motorhome’s sunroof. The motorhome was perched precariously on its side with five people trapped inside.
Shane Charman, the station officer at Maryborough Fire Station, told the Fraser Coast Chronicle that the scene had been “very challenging” for emergency services crews.
Of the five people were trapped, three had to be rescued through the sunroof after the vehicle was left on its side in a ditch after the crash.
“We were lucky that we had access to the sunroof,” said Mr Charman. “We were able to use that as a rescue point to get three of the casualties to safety.”
Heavy rescue equipment had to be used to gain access to two others in the vehicle.
All five people, who were travelling from Brisbane, escaped without serious injury.
Last week, two caravanning grey nomads were killed on the Cobb Highway in New South Wales after they apparently veered into the path of the truck as it tried to overtake.
A few days earlier, a Singaporean man died on the Indian Ocean Drive south of Lancelin when his car seemingly drifted to the wrong side of the road before colliding with a red four-wheel-drive towing a caravan travelling in the opposite direction. The dead man had been driving with his partner and two children.
The spate of accidents has sparked appeals for greater safety measures to be introduced, including a call from the Western Australia’s Road Safety Commissioner, Kim Papalia, for a five-star safety rating to be introduced for caravan manufacturers.
·        Comment below
It’s sad to see such carnage on our roads. But please, stop for a moment and think, when are people going to start and take responsibility for their own actions. You have to be responsible for what you do. And that includes driving on the road.
Is the motorhome licensed to carry 5 people?
Rather than wasting time and money on five star rateing on manufacturing
I rather see it go on training owner to operate there vehicles correctly.
That looks like a disaster waiting to happen anyway,caravan is to heavy for motorhome to tow as I’m sure the weight limit is 1.5 ton,and five people in motor home is too many ,they generally have maximum of 4.
Just stupidity!!!
The first question that comes to mind is :- why is a motorhome towing a caravan.
I am always amazed at the stupidity of people who do not think about safety on our roads. I wonder if the motorhome was a rental for starters, surely no-one with any knowledge of Aussie roads would attempt such a stupid, stupid thing. Glad they’re safe but it just highlights the need for training before anyone gets behind the wheel of a motorhome or towing a caravan,
Some vans are unstable at speeds below the legal limit. I towed a ‘Windsor Windcheater’ (less than 1 tonne) behind my Magna (rated to tow 1200kg). I had a weight distribution hitch in use and the speed limit was 100kph. As the rig got to 90kph I noticed tail sway starting to occur. This became very severe almost immediately. I did all the actions recommended in such a situation. Applied trailer brakes through the controller – did not fix sway. Accelerated to pull rig straight – did not fix it. Finally Very gently applied brakes dropping speed off. Not recommended but on this occasion it worked. I stopped and the car behind me stopped also. That driver testified that the sway was so bad that the van was pitching, lifting its’ wheels off the road and as I had the van brakes applied each time a wheel returned to the road a cloud of smoke would erupt similar to an aeroplane landing. The van was not overweight. The load was distributed about its axle. The towball download was approx100kg or about 10% of the vans mass. The tow vehicle was within specs also. I was 10kph below the legal maximum speed. I had many 1000’s of kilometres towing experience, yet disaster was only narrowly avoided. There should be a driving skills test required to be passed for all people towing caravans or similar, (car floats, horse floats etc.). This has been called for by the trucking industry and I fully support their call. Some caravan towers protest about this. If you have the necessary skills it should be no problem to pass such an assessment. If you don’t then should you be towing?
Interested to hear others opinions on this. Chris.
Chris you sre absolutely right. The problem arises when people just freak out in these situations. All their training goes out the window when fear and fright takes over. My partner tells me that when we encounter passing a road train for example, coming in the opposite direction, he reduces speed by decelerating, not breaking and we tow with a five tonne truck with a long wheelbase. Exhaust brakes help. Vigilance is the key and knowing how to avoid a situstion before it occurs.
I’m new to this caravan game, but before our van arrives next year I’m very definitely doing a towing course. I am amazed at people who I see at the local tip who can’t even back a box trailer, but so many people probably wouldn’t even give a thought to hitching up a caravan.