Do deer count as an act of god? Or bears? Or moose?
Actually yeah I think moose ARE gods (or something suitably eldritch) so I’ll accept that evaluation. Those things can pop out of the woods straight into traffic at a pace that borders teleportation, despite their immense size.
I managed to cause a set of flashing moose road signs put into a stretch of highway after running a very drawn-out low-level court case with our provincial insurer. I was able to get records through Freedom of Information requests that this stretch had multiple collisions with moose (locals knew it as “moose alley”), and that the driver who killed the moose just left it on the road so my poor clients ran into it in the dark. The insurer’s initial explanation for the crash was that the driver drove over the shoulder into the swamp through careless driving, no moose involved 
Poor moose. 
Yes and I covered that: act of god.
Yes obvs
I like when transport trucks see this about to happen, and move over so they’re straddling the shoulder 
Exactly. Many states are now calling them “crashes”. There is always something, whether stupid, ignorant or careless, that caused it.
So if a herd of deer run across the road in front of you, that’s your fault?
Nothing new about “there are no accidents”. I was on a safety team that reviewed crashes and near misses for years. And when you break down the events leading to the crash you can find the cause. Similar to the Swiss cheese model.
And why is the term ‘near miss’ used? If it missed its a close call, and if it hit it’s a crash.
You truly are my ‘horse theme’ hero 
So if a small child runs across the road in front of you, that’s your fault?
Yes. Yes it is. You should have your vehicle under such control that you can deal with unexpected events as they occur.
So a kid you can’t see running out of between two parked cars when you are driving appropriately is the drivers fault? Around here deer and moose tend to wander out into the roads at dawn or dusk when it is really hard to spot them, deer especially can do amazing leaps in front of vehicles, even over fences that would hold the normal horse. You just can’t foresee that happening, the only way to avoid that is to be going about 10KM.
So that somebody going faster can rear end you.
My sister, fully DOT compliant, insured, professional transporter who’s had a CDL for more than 30 years, got hung up at a weigh station in North Carolina. Though I cannot remember the infraction, it was a catch-22 type of rule she couldn’t have known about or solved, especially in the moment. The state police officer held her up for two hours. Luckily, she had a single chill horse on board. The fact that she was a state LEO in another state cut no ice with this guy.
It took several emails over a few months to back them off, and they never admitted an error or officially ended the dispute.
That would be their fault no? 
Actually, I saw a buck coming and stopped. He changed course and ran into ME!
Deer aren’t really bright, I had one jump a fence a bit in front of me once, and another time, I remember coming home from the barn one night after dark, coming out of a very small village with minimal street lights, and thinking WTF is that on the road in front of me? If I was a less observant driver driver doing the speed limit I could have hit that deer standing in the middle of my lane.
[quote=“Annie10, post:177, topic:805258, full:true”]
I disagree. You can’t control everything at all times. And that’s also why I have a dashcam in my personal vehicle, because of the histrionics and liability-minded culture we are in these days. I mean right now somewhere near Seattle, a person who had a a yard between a street and a culdesac that was being driven thru at some point put two posts and a cable up to prevent vehicular traffic, a little kid tried to drive an electric scooter (news media shows something that looks like a small motorcycle to me but they are calling it a scooter over and over) through the yard and hit it and died. G-Public is coming for the property owner’s head.
A herd of deer or a dog or godforbid a child running in front of your car? Totally depends. If you had time to see it and react and stop? If you didn’t? What is the speed limit? Weight of the vehicle? Condition of the road? If you overreacted and went off the road or into another lane and caused a different collision entirely? Other factors come into play, that’s why accident reconstructionists are paid so much (my dream retirement gig because I like collisions to begin with but hooo boy there’s a lot of physics behind it).
Driving in Maine after dark. Came to an almost stop based on instinct. Yep, there was a moose. You do not see them at night as their eyes do not reflect. Knew several people who had hit moose. FTR the car looses. That said, I do agree many crashes (overall) COULD have been avoided. This truck/tour bus crash is on local trial now.
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