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36. Night Driving

Basic safety rules for night driving:

Put your lights on early! SEE and BE SEEN!
Keep your windscreen and head-lights clean.	A dirty windscreen, and/or dirty headlights reduce visibility greatly.
Don’t look into oncoming headlights.	To keep on course, if blinded, gauge your steering on the left boundary of the road, until traffic has passed.
Dip your headlights for oncoming traffic, (minimum 200 m)...	... and when following another vehicle. Most modern vehicles display a blue warning light when lights are on high beam.

A simple error, failing to switch on the headlights at night, caused a serious, horror crash:

It is raining and winter time, already dark even at 5 pm. Rushing home from work to meet a tight social schedule, the young driver is about to turn right, happy that there appears to be a big gap in the long queue of oncoming headlights.

The experienced motorist judges his approach to take advantage of this space, as to turn without delay. After deciding to turn, a last minute glimpse through the wet windscreen reveals a horrible truth - an imminent collision.    What he had perceived as a gap in the darkness of the oncoming traffic, was a vehicle WITHOUT headlights!    CRASH!

Driving on high-beam may dazzle oncoming drivers, either directly or via the rear-vision mirror. Find out before driving an unfamiliar vehicle (hire-car etc) which is the high-beam switch/warning light.

Searching for any control switch while driving is distracting. It leads to problems. This goes also for all other controls (windscreen wiper, lights, radio etc.) as well as the seat adjustments. (See Section 1 - Preparation to drive). 

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Our information could vary in your part of the world. We recommend you use above information in conjunction with a professional driving instructor.

Road Safety by Dieter Fischer - Learner Driver Hub 2020.