My initial thought when hearing about all of this was exactly that: they hit the accelerator instead of the brakes. It took me a while to realise why they weren

My initial thought when hearing about all of this was exactly that: they hit the accelerator instead of the brakes. It took me a while to realise why they weren't standing on the clutch: most cars in the US have automatic gearboxes. I'm guessing this sort of thing basically doesn't happen when you have a clutch, which, if you're used to driving cars with a manual transmission, you'll instinctively jump onto when braking. If you hit the gas instead of the brakes, you won't stop very fast, but at least you won't accelerate.