“I’ve seen some speculation that he smashed into the car in front of him because the crowd of people obscured it from his view.”
Typically, when you are driving a 3,700 pound vehicle and your view is obscured, you stop the vehicle.
Not when you are surrounded by hostile people, some of whom are carrying bats.
Check your Freepmail in a few minutes.
“...when you are driving a 3,700 pound vehicle and your view is obscured, you stop the vehicle.”
Has this ever happened to you? Surrounded and blocked by a hostile, armed mob, threatened, assaulted...
It happened to me, back in 1970. I tried to proceed, until a previously stopped car got in my way. I stopped, and turned off my engine; it almost got me killed. The mob attacked my car, broke my rear window, tore open my hood and started yanking my distributer wires. Fortunately for me, the biggest State Trooper I’ve ever seen blocked access to my driver’s side door; told me to stay in the car. Then a line of State Police riot squad swept the crowd aside, another trooper in plain clothes jury rigged the distributer, and the big guy got in my car and drove me out of there.
My experience tells me: don’t stop. Back up out of there if you can. Don’t try to push through a crowd that is too deep and dense to see through, unless you have an armored car or tank. (Oddly enough, a military vehicle collector did exactly that on the same day I got trapped, but he had an M3 armored scout car. Helped the StatePolice clear the road for a while.)