Fog horror facts
Page 42
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• Paul Fisher's article on tanker safety headed "Horror stories" (CM 13-19 June) attacks both lazy reporting and the Thames Valley Police.
I drove along the M4 from London to Theale a matter of hours before the accident near Hungerford. For much of my journey driving conditions were almost perfect. Unfortunately there are numerous flooded gravel pits along the route which produce banks of dense fog for relatively short distances, followed by clear conditions.
My experience of motorway driving suggests that the matrix signs are normally some considerable distance apart and that they are ignored if the hazard is not apparent within a relatively short distance.
Given the prevailing conditions at the time of the accident, it is likely that there would have been patches of both dense fog and clear roads between the signs. I believe that the police were right not to activate the matrix signs.
There is one other example of lazy reporting in the article. The accident happened on Wednesday 13 March and was reported by the daily papers used in your photographic spread the following morning. CDP Leadbeater Basingstoke.
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