36 A.2d 376 | Conn. | 1944
This action arose out of a collision between two automobiles within the intersection of Hubbard Avenue and Bridge Street in Stamford, and resulted in a judgment for the plaintiff. The appeal does not question the correctness of the trial court's conclusion that the defendant driver was negligent. The only claim is that the plaintiff was guilty of *644 contributory negligence as a matter of law in that she failed to grant the statutory right of way to the motor vehicle of the defendants, which was approaching the intersection on the right of her car.
The following findings made by the trial court have not been attacked. The plaintiff was driving north on Hubbard Avenue on a clear day at a speed of twenty-five miles an hour. When she reached a point close to the intersection of Bridge Street she brought her car to a stop, although there was no stop sign there, and looked both to her right and her left along Bridge Street, but saw no traffic upon it. Her view was unobstructed in both directions. She then proceeded slowly across the intersection, and 90 per cent of her car had passed out of it when the right rear of her automobile was struck by the right front of the defendants' car, which had been proceeding westerly along Bridge Street. The plaintiff did not see the defendants' car at any time before the collision took place. The plaintiff's car had entered the intersection first.
The court further found that when the operator of the defendants' car was upwards of two hundred feet from the intersection he saw the plaintiff's car as it was about to enter the intersection at a slow rate of speed. A principal assignment of error is directed at this finding, and the defendants concede that unless it can be corrected in vital respects they cannot prevail upon their appeal. We cannot make changes which would materially affect the result.
It is true that the test is not which car actually entered the intersection first. McNaught v. Smith,
Under the circumstances of this case the plaintiff's failure to see the defendants' car until the moment of impact did not make her guilty of contributory negligence as a matter of law. Hoyt v. Connecticut Co.,
There is no error.