{"id":2052,"date":"2020-02-18T18:43:07","date_gmt":"2020-02-18T15:43:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zippole.com\/?page_id=2052"},"modified":"2021-08-05T18:25:42","modified_gmt":"2021-08-05T15:25:42","slug":"experiences","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/experiences","title":{"rendered":"Experiences"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>How the passive safe pole ZIPpole saves lives: a testimonial from Dirk, a teacher<\/h2>\n<p><em>On 29 December, Goormansstraat in Zandhoven was shaken by a loud bang: Dirk Van Dingenen, suddenly overcome by tiredness, collided with a lamppost. He had fallen asleep at the wheel. Luckily, he was just shaken up. The passive safe pole he hit, a ZIPpole, flattened and probably saved his life.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/dFjKbmATU08?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3>Tired after a long night flight<\/h3>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019d flown back from holiday overnight\u201d, Dirk begins his story. \u201cSo I hadn\u2019t had a wink of sleep. We took a taxi from Brussels Airport to Grobbendonk, but when we got home I didn\u2019t feel tired at all. So I decided to go and see my father in the care home. I figured I would just take a nap afterwards.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Dirk set off for the care home in Zandhoven, a journey of barely 10 minutes. But, on the way, he was overcome by tiredness and nodded off behind the wheel. Dirk: \u201cI woke up in Goormansstraat because I drove onto the verge. I saw that I was heading straight for a lamppost, but didn\u2019t have enough reaction time to avoid it. I collided with the pole sideways on, at around 70 km\/h.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy car was smashed in at the front on the right-hand side and I came to a stop facing the other way. The pole had gone completely flat and crumpled. I wasn\u2019t hurt at all, apart from a small graze on my hand. I got out and called the emergency services myself. I realise that I was extremely lucky: my brother died 25 years ago in a similar accident with a concrete post.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-15-55.jpg\" alt=\"zippole accident\" width=\"1440\" height=\"1920\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-2061\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-15-55.jpg 1440w, https:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-15-55-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-15-55-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-15-55-1152x1536.jpg 1152w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1440px) 100vw, 1440px\" \/><\/p>\n<h3>The ZIPpole: how it works<\/h3>\n<p>Fortunately, the local council in Zandhoven had invested in road safety and installed ZIPpoles from Safety Product. Carolien Willems, managing director of Safety Product, explains how they work: \u201cThe ZIPpole is a passive safe pole, specially designed to flatten when someone collides with it. It\u2019s made from a thin sheet of a special type of elastic steel, which is rolled so that the ends overlap. Instead of being welded, they\u2019re riveted together. As soon as one of the rivets gets hit, it breaks off. This triggers a chain reaction in the other rivets, which also break off, so that the pole unzips \u2013 that\u2019s why it\u2019s called a \u2018ZIPpole\u2019. Due to a combination of the type of steel, the material thickness and the rivets, the pole flattens and the car is brought to a halt.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-16-05.jpg\" alt=\"zippole accident\" width=\"1440\" height=\"1920\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-2062\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-16-05.jpg 1440w, https:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-16-05-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-16-05-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/zippole.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/photo-2019-12-30-09-16-05-1152x1536.jpg 1152w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1440px) 100vw, 1440px\" \/><\/p>\n<h3>The importance of government institutions<\/h3>\n<p>Safety Product makes the ZIPpole, but it\u2019s the councils and authorities \u2013 in other words: the owners of the roads \u2013 who decide if and where they are installed. <\/p>\n<p>Carolien: \u201cOf course, it isn\u2019t always financially feasible to replace every pole with a passive safe pole, but drawing up a step-by-step plan and providing the most dangerous locations with a passive safe pole is often a first move. They can then look into the ZIPpole as a possible alternative for the other poles when renovating, replacing or laying new roads. It\u2019s only when the authorities decide to invest in safe road infrastructure \u2013 including safe verges \u2013 that ZIPpoles can make a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>They certainly did for Dirk: \u201cI\u2019m extremely grateful to Zandhoven and hope that they can inspire other local authorities to do the same\u201d, he concludes. \u201cPassive safe poles may not be as attractive an investment as a new sports hall, for example, but the potential impact is enormous.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>Do you want to see ZIPpoles in your area too?<\/h3>\n<p><strong><a href=\"\/products\/\">Check out our products<\/a><\/strong> or <strong><a href=\"\/contact\/\">contact us<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2>More experiences in real life accidents<\/h2>\nngg_shortcode_0_placeholder\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How the passive safe pole ZIPpole saves lives: a testimonial from Dirk, a teacher On 29 December, Goormansstraat in Zandhoven was shaken by a loud bang: Dirk Van Dingenen, suddenly overcome by tiredness, collided with a lamppost. He had fallen &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/experiences\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2052","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.2","language":"de","enabled_languages":["en","nl","fr","de","es","it","pl","ru","zh"],"languages":{"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"nl":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"fr":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"de":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"es":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"it":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"pl":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"ru":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"zh":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false}}},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2052"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2421,"href":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2052\/revisions\/2421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zippole.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}