Introduction:
Aquaplaning means that a film of water forms between the road surface and the car’s tyre. The tyre then loses most of its grip on the road surface and effectively starts to ‘float’. As a result, the vehicle becomes uncontrollable. The risk of aquaplaning increases when driving through ruts in the road surface, with tyres that have little tread depth, tyre pressure that is too low, a light vehicle in combination with wide tyres, a speed that is too high, or a combination of all these factors.
The image shows a tyre with less than 2.5 mm of tread in the centre. Because during rainfall it can disperse less water than a tyre with, for example, more than 5 mm of tread, the risk of aquaplaning, and therefore also the risk of collisions, will increase. It is therefore advisable to replace tyres with less than 2.5 mm of tread.
What to do in case of aquaplaning:
When you accelerate during aquaplaning, the wheel without grip will rotate faster and only spray water away from between the tyre and the road surface. Braking will reduce the film of water between tyre and road surface, but then there is a risk that when the tyre regains contact with the road surface, it will have too low a speed and thus create a new risk of skidding because the wheel speed is too low. The best thing to do is therefore to release the accelerator and use engine braking until there is contact with the road surface again. After that, the speed can be adjusted.