Horrific Accident in Dubai

I'm not sure if this has made the international news, but yesterday we had the worst traffic accident in the history of the UAE. Over 200 cars (the actual number is yet to be counted) were involved in a pile up on the road from Abu Dhabi to Dubai. The fog over the past couple of weeks has been unbelievable in the mornings. Visibility is down to 10m at times.

Ironically, I was just planning to write a post about the fog here. It's a bit odd for it to be so foggy in the desert (well maybe it's not I've never lived in a desert before). But to me, desert equals dry. Since Dubai is on the Persian Gulf, we have a lot of moisture that gets into the air. Lately, the weather has been beautiful and warm during the day - probably leading to moisture evaporating from the Gulf - and then cool at night. Perfect conditions for fog.

When I leave the house each morning (around 6am) the fog is thick, but it actually seems to get worse closer to the rush hour and then finally burns off somewhere between 9 to 11. Yesterday, the fog in the center of Dubai was pretty well gone by around 8am. But there were still areas where it was "as thick as pea soup" - so the saying goes. Drivers here have this odd habit of driving with their hazard lights blinking when in the fog. Not just when they've been stopped for traffic, but all the time. So, you can never tell if the blinking hazards are a hazard - or just a warning for other drivers to watch out because I'm coming through at my same crazy speed as any other day.

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Driving with hazards was a direct contribution to yesterday's pile up. Since depth perception is reduced in fog, approaching drivers saw the hazards, but didn't realize the cars were actually stopped until it was too late. That combined with a disregard for safe speeds - it was bound to happen. I'm surprised it hasn't happend on other occasions, actually. One of the witnesses reported that it was so foggy, he actually pulled off the road because he couldn't see. Lucky him - or clever guy, actually. The official reports range from 3 to 5 to 8 deaths, 30 to 60 cars on fire, and 60 to 300+ cars in the pile up. From the reports it sounds like it was 4 separate pile ups. Some cars would come safely to a halt and then the traffic would pile up again behind them.

In the UAE, you are three times more likely to die in a traffic accident than in the US. Last year, the traffic deaths in the UAE were at a rate of 44.65 per 100,000 people (compared to a US national average of 14.24 per 100,000 in 2006). In 92% of the cases, the fatalities were caused by male drivers. There definitely is some sort of male bravado in Arab men when it comes to driving - and the behaviors get picked up by everyone else on the road. We've all had the experience of gasping in shock when a crazy driver overtakes us at break-neck speed and proceeds to weave in and out of traffic ahead of us. But here - this happens every day. Heaven help you if you are going anywhere near the speed limit and are in the left hand lane. For sure someone will come up behind you, tailgate about 2 feet behind you, flash their lights, and honk their horns for you to get out of the way. If you move into the next lane just a second too late, they will swoop into the next lane and speed up to pass you on the right. I can't tell you how many times I've had to swerve back into the left lane to avoid a collision with the guy behind me. Or, even more crazily, they'll pull onto the middle divide between the highways and try to squeeze past you.