(Atlantic) Farmers are or soon will be hard at work harvesting the 2020 crop, and drivers on Iowa’s roadways will likely encounter sizeable, slow-moving farm equipment.
Cass County Sheriff Darby McLaren offers this advice to drivers navigating around harvest equipment. McLaren says slow down, watch for signals, allow for sweeping turns, pass carefully, and be patient.
Sheriff McLaren says traveling at a high rate of speed around large equipment also goes hand-in-hand with patience.
McLaren says, unfortunately, this type of accident occurs annually and many times leads to a severe accident.
The Center for Transportation and Research defines slow-moving vehicles as any vehicle that cannot maintain a constant speed of at least 25 mph, such as large farm equipment, construction vehicles, or horse-drawn buggies. These vehicles vary significantly in size, visibility, operating speeds (typically well below the posted speed), and maneuverability (usually based on driver experience).
Though the number of crashes involving SMVs is lower than the number of crashes involving other vehicle types, SMV crashes tend to be severe. A collision involving slow-moving large farm equipment is about five times more likely to result in a fatality than other crash types.
