I’ve seen a lot of auto accidents both in real life and on tv.
Most are bumper to bumper, or weather related skids, or one vehicle straight into the side of another.
One I haven’t seen which I’m suprised at is the side-to-side hit of someone not looking and turning into the occupied lane next to them. I’m suprised because I have seen it numerous times as a close call but no actual hits. Usually its someone who neglects to check the lane next to them, starts turning in, the guy in the occupied lane blasts his horn, and the person jerks violently back into their own lane.
Have you ever seen this type of accident?
Does it send the cars or lighter car out of control? or do they just bump off eachother?
Does it do much damage or just scratch up the side of the car pretty good?
I’ve seen it once–moving car vs. stopped bus. I was on the bus. Yeah, the car got scratched up pretty good.
Never seen one of those, although the way that some idiots change lanes on the freeway, I can’t imagine why.
Actually, I can only recall seeing two accidents in all my time driving. The most memorable was looking in the rearview mirror to see if the car that flew by was going as fast as I thought it was going and seeing it flipping over in a shower of sparks. Woman driving the car was speeding and playing with the radio, drifted off the road, hit a stone wall and flipped it. When I drove back to help (dreading what I would see), she had already crawled out of the car and was swearing a blue streak. Her main concern was that she had only had one more payment on the car.
Not only have I seen it - I’ve done it! Although probably not at the speeds that you are thinking about. I was slowing down before a light, and knew I had to get in the next lane over before the next light so I could make my turn. Go to change lanes - and crunch. In my case, the guy in the other car said he was stopped there before I went to change lanes, but I didn’t see him. Since we were both going slow/stopped, there wasn’t much force between the two cars, so not much impact. Also, he was in a SUV and I was in an Accord.
Upshot - some driver side damage to my car, and a ticket for improper lane change.
Susan
I was in that type of accident once. We were in the right lane and a woman in the next lane wasn’t paying attention to what was going on ahead of her. There was a stopped car in her lane and she didn’t see it in time to stop herself, so she swerved into our lane without looking and clipped us. We weren’t going tremendously fast, so no one was hurt and we only had fairly minor damage.
I saw one of these.
I was about to walk across the street, and was looking both ways like a good boy when it happened about 100 feet away from me.
A (new at the time) late-seventies Cadillac in the middle of three lanes swerved hard into a Mercury station-wagon in the left lane as they were crossing a short bridge. The Mercury hit the median curb, which was rather high, and flipped. It hit a large sedan in the opposing left lane in such a way that the grill of each car went through the windshield of the other.
The drivers of the Mercury and the sedan were killed, and the sedan drivers wife and daughter were severely injured.
According to the newspaper the Cadillac driver went home and was asleep when they came to arrest him.
You guessed it. He was drunk and claimed to not remember hitting anyone.
I’ve been in one of these, in city traffic. The driver to my right decided to switch into my lane, while I was occupying it. Scratched up and dented the back passenger side quarter panel on my car. I don’t remember the damage to the other car.
I’ve also been in a near miss on the freeway like this. I was in the left lane, they were entering from a ramp. For some reason the right lane wasn’t good enough for them and they just keep sliding left. I swerved to avoid them, ended up in the ditch and totalled the car, while they just kept going. Still haven’t decided if I should have let them just hit me.
I’ve been in one like this, ~20 years ago. Doing maybe 80k (50mph) on the freeway and this guy beside me decides he needs to be in my lane RIGHT NOW and jerks the wheel hard - I still have no idea why as there were no exits coming up. BANG! and I nearly get pushed into the Armco, took a bit of fancy driving not to die right there.
About 10 years ago I was telling this story as the stupidest, least-excusable accident I’ve ever been involved in and as I approach the conclusion - police, breath tests, exchanging details etc - I become aware that the (fairly distinctive) surname of the guy who clobbered me (who I’ve just been excoriating mercilessly, including making fun of the name) was the same as that of the cow-orker I was talking to … yep, it was her husband who hit me. I have to say she took it well.
Many years ago in my Pennsylvania hometown, I once lightly sideswiped a Chevy sedan with my parent’s behemoth '72 Mercury wagon after dozing off at the wheel while driving home from work (night shift at the railroad). Amazingly, after stopping, the other driver told me to just go on because the point of contact had already been dented previously and so in his view no further damage had been done. I’m not sure I’d have been so understanding.
Karma almost struck back last year on Sawdust Road in The Woodlands, TX. I was on my way home from the pool hall about 11 PM when I got behind a Honda Civic going about 15 MPH in the left lane of the dual carriageway. I decided to go around him on the right, anjd just as I did, he began drifting to the right as well. I just managed to squeak by and despite my laying on the horn he continued to drift until he ended up going into the ditch and out the other side, ending up in a Whataburger parking lot to the consternation of everyone in the restaurant and, no doubt, himself.
The best one, though,occurred one day when I was aboard the 21 bus in Paris and watched as an older guy in a Ford Escort, traveling in an adjacent lane, apparently had a brain fart and turned right, straight into the side of the bus. The point of impact was about halfway back, so it’s not as if he didn’t see it.
I was driving along Pasadena’s Colorado Boulevard as a fire truck, returning to its station was alongside of me to the left. The driver wanted to move into my lane but was absorbed in watching a Porsche right behind me. Once he was sure he was clear of the Porsche he moved over right into me. Damage was slight, but the poor driver of the truck was embarassed and razzed by his fellow firedudes. In fairness I guess he could be pardoned for choosing to crunch up a small five-year-old Nissan sedan rather than a bright red, fairly new, Porsche.
I got two to contribute.
Back wen I was wrenching, I was test driving a customer’s car up a busy street, two lanes, with parallel parking. I was in the center lane and up ahead a guy was backing into a parking space. Behind him was a guy in an old Ford Pickup. As I go past the guy in the P/U decides to change part way into my lane and go around the car that is parking. I feel the back end of the Volvo shift about 6"-12" to the left all of a sudden. That dickhead hit me!
So we pull around the corner to a parking lot to exchange info, I look at the car, and there is not a scratch on it. I look and look no scratches. After about two minutes of looking, I notice a diviot dug out of the sidewall of the tire! the corner of the front bumper hit the sidewall of my tire, and pushed the car far enough to the left that the bodywork behind the rear wheel did not get touched. Made my life easy when I had to go back and tell the boss that I was in an accident.
The second one was a video a customer sent us about an accident their daughter had. Seems the daughter was a HS student that had a very busy day. Up at 4 AM running all day and when driving home at about 9 PM she fell asleep at the wheel, and the car drifted off the road to the driver’s right. This area (local desert) had very wide shoulders with a berm at the outer edge, completly clear except for telephone poles every so often. Anyway she hit a pole, the point of impact was about at the right front wheel. The damage was:
[ul]
[li]Missing right front suspension[/li][li]Rght front fender torn off[/li][li]Right A-pillar (windshield pillar) torn off[/li][li]Right B-pillar (between seats) torn off[/li][li]Right C-pillar (behind rear seat) torn off[/li][li]Roof hanging in mid air on right side[/li][li]Right rear fender only attached back at tail lights[/li][/ul]
The passenger’s seat was OK.
Anyway, the video showed the daughter (a little banged up, but OK), the car (destroyed) and then they showed the pole that she hit. They must make telephone poles out of kyptronite or something, because there was not a mark on the pole! Damn those things are solid!
Almost in another yesterday in Baltimore. Old guy driving a cab. It astounds me.
THe ONE freakin’ thing you have to think about when you’re changing lanes is “is it occupied?”. Everyone knows they have a blind spot. Really astounding that it ever happens.
(I just jinxed myself to do it on the way home today.)
A couple from about 30 years ago (I was at home so I didn’t actually see them):
The family station wagon had long since been relegated to road trips and being borrowed by one sibling or another. Dad was driving his '71 Pinto (one of the few cars he had bought new) home from work and got stuck in a snowdrift. It was still snowing so he trudged toward a nearby farmhouse to call for help. At some point while he’s gone, two things happen: the car gets completely covered and a snowplow came by. You guessed it, the plow’s blade clipped the car! Completely removed the left front fender & headlight.
My brother drove a sky blue VW Squareback in the early '70s. He was returning home one spring day on Illinois Route 7, a two-lane blacktop when he pulled around to pass someone. Unbeknownst to him, at the same time that someone had decided to pass someone else! Bro ended up in the middle of a cornfield after rolling several times, glass was everywhere. There was a gas station on Illinois 7 on the outskirts of the nearest big town (Kankakee) that displayed bad wrecks as a reminder for everyone to drive carefully. The remains of that VW sat there for a good long time.
My best friend had this type of accident in her 1998 VW Jetta GT a few years back. Three passengers; they were approaching an intersection where she wanted to make a right, and the passenger up front says it’s clear to get into the right lane. Friend takes her word for it and starts to move over. Just then, a car approaching at ~20 mph that was already in that lane slams into her right rear fender, pushing her car up onto the curb and completely demolishing a concrete bus-stop bench. Luckily, no one had been waiting for the bus or there would have been a fatality for sure. The guy in the rear passenger-side seat had had his elbow propped up on the sill; his entire arm went through the glass and was badly lacerated and broken. The entire right rear quarterpanel was ripped off and had to be replaced, front end had damage and had to be replaced. I don’t even know about the other car.
I had a close call with this sort of thing myself, just two weeks ago – I’ve been borrowing my mom’s Olds-behemoth-mobile, and the first day driving it I wasn’t used to all the blind spots yet. I now nearly break my neck to check for those Benzos that like to pass me at 10 MPH over the speed limit around here!
I was in one of these too.
I was a passenger in a Chevette going west on US 40 near New Castle, Delaware. The driver was a girl that just started at our company, and we were out on a date. We had just come from Pizza Hut, and were heading back to my place. We seemed to be hitting it off fairly well…
We were i the left lane. A black Camaro zoomed by on the right, at least 25 mph faster than us, and traffic was heavy enough that we were stuck in the lane. As we approached an intersection, as second car, a white Camaro, pulled alongside us. He was following the guy in the other Camaro, and when the black car moved into the left lane to turn he moved over too, not even looking over. How do I know he didn’t look? I had the perfect view of him staring at the back of the other car as he drifted forward half a car length then pulled into our lane. His rear hit just in front of my door, and we began to spin out.
I didn’t see my life flashing before my eyes, but I did wonder if this was it. I had a death grip on the dashboard, and I looked over to my date ( I don’t remember her name, although I think it may have been Diane.) She was reacting well; she turned into the skid and held on. We flipped around 180 degrees, slid through the intersection, and came to rest in the median.
I think that when she pulled the wheel, it kept us from sliding sideways and rolling. Our skid marks were more than 100 feet long; I credit the loose sand in the median.
The damage was a crushed fender and two blown tires on the Chevelle, and a crushed quarter panel on the Camaro.
The first guy never saw anything and drove on. The second guy was apologetic, but he was more into the damage to his car than anything else. He wasn’t cited for intoxication, but he looked a little glazed over- either the accident flipped him out or he was buzzing real good.
I got a ride back to my plce by some bystanders, and returned a few minutes later with my company truck. I ended up taking her home- I tried to comfort her, but she was pretty shook up and concerned about her car. I ended up taking her home.
Here’s the wierd part…
At work the next day, she was OK- we ended up working the route together that day. There were also a few new hires, as usual- although one of them looked very familiar. I was doing some of their paperwork when i was asked to photocopy the drivers licenses of the new guys, and when I got to the one I suddenly realized why it looked familiar.
I had it in my hand the previous night- it was White Camaro guy!
I let the boss know about everything, and the point was moot because he never came back after the first day.
Bloody hell, Mad Hermit – when was this? Back in the late 70s my brother’s friend had a black Camaro, and the idiot was always racing and drag racing down Rt 40, and also Rt 7 near Stantion.
I was driving a bright red, 28,000 lb truck once when someone didn’t see me :wally and switched lanes into me.
The side of the car was a mess but never acually hit the truck, just the lug nuts/wheel hub.
ummm, well I can’t say I saw it but I had an 18 wheeler change lanes into 2 week old new (used) car. Yes my car spun out of countrol went across 4 lanes and ended up in oncoming traffic. It did $6000.00 worth of damage to my car I borrowed $8000.00 to buy. I was convinced they would total my car and all of the settlement would go to pay off the loan and I would have nothing to buy another car with. Fortunatly, they repaired it although the car was never the same. He says he didn’t see me although we were just stopped at a red light, I thinkthat what saved me is we werent’ going very fast. Scared the crap out of me.
In 2000 I was headed south in the second from the left lane on the NJTP in a 6-lane wide (in the one direction) section when a box truck, i.e., a low-cab-forward truck with a medium-sized box body that was in the left (median) lane, two cars ahead of me, moved right, into the second (my) lane and then moved into the third lane and sideswiped a long flatbed semi. the box truck swerved and careered and then flipped onto its right side and slid a couple hundred feet. This is two cars in front of me.
Traffic stopped of course and as I was next in line and could see that the box truck driver was walking around on his side window and I determined he was o.k., I went on my way.