Yeah, I was thinking along these lines as well. I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt here. Perhaps the rescuer could have led them out of that area, or maybe stayed with them a little longer to make sure they were alright. Not trying to assess blame here.
Here’s the deal. I worked (as a photographer) on a story about handling yourself in a submerged car in the Netherlands for Car and Driver. Here it is. The upshot is basically, once you hit the water, unbuckle your belt, roll down your windows, turn on your lights (if they’re not already on–gives the rescue team an extra aid to finding your body in case you don’t get out right away). The driving school wanted students to wait until the car was fully submerged, then open the door and make their way out. IIRC, everyone except for one person panicked and went right out the window (which worked.) When there is a pressure differential (i.e., car partially submerged) it is nigh impossible to open the door. The windows are left open to allow the pressure to equalize quickly so you can make your escape. Where people took the window way out is the while the door does open once the car is submerged, it opens much more slowly, so it might take, say, 5 seconds for it to open up instead of instantly opening up. Most people gave up at this point and just took the window way out. (The article itself mentions 1 in 5 people panicking, but my recollection is that nobody except for one person went out the door. But memory is a funny thing.)
This is horrible. Some people just have the worst luck. It reminds me of the story a couple years ago where a woman was being raped when a man came by and scared the rapist away, then started raping her too.
A Dodge Caravan would probably float pretty well, it was probably floating by the time they realized they were in water. I still can’t imagine how you couldn’t get out though. Power locks aren’t an issue, I’ve never seen a car that doesn’t unlock mechanically from the inside even if the door is locked. If they didn’t, people would be trapped and dying all the time due to dead batteries. This was an 01 Dodge too, not the most complicated, high tech vehicle. Some manual locks will only open if they’re in the unlocked position, but that just requires you to reach over and pull up the knob (or flip the tab or whatever, but the caravan would have a knob).
Ok I think this story tops the OP in the bad luck sweepstakes.
Holy Shit!
Justin Kirkbride survived a plane crash with two other people. Then he lived through the crash of the rescue helicopter about 16 hours later. I don’t know if you’d call it bad luck or the best luck in the world but I’m never sitting next to him.
pulykamell I really am not trying to be too off topic, do you have some better snapshots of the experience? Car & Driver seemed to have used less than the best shots. Any “action” photos?
Very interesting story…I would also use the window,quickly.
Well, if you are already stuck on the plane with him, it’s probably not a bad idea to stick pretty close.
There are people who have survived both atomic bombs.
As in, caught in them and survived.
In our local graveyard is buried a young man who, about ten years ago, was walking home along an unlit country road when he was hit by a car. The driver got out and was mightily relieved to find the young man still alive.
Then another car came along and hit him again.
I guess I can understand how someone could drive down a boat ramp when visibility is severely limited. What I *don’t *understand is why someone would remain in the vehicle after it hit the water.
I’m going to hell for this, of course, but what this brings to my twisted mind is the old football cheer, “Hit 'em again, hit 'em again, harder, harder!”
Friend of a friend did a sensible thing and rode his bike to a bar to meet another friend who drove. Bike rider was trying to be responsible about drunk driving.
The bicyclist left first, and the driving friend accidentally ran him down and killed him.
Yeah, don’t ask me what the deal is with the online version of the article and the art accompanying it. The article came out long before they decided to make their content available online, and it does not have the same photos that ran in the magazine. Unfortunately, I don’t have digitized versions of the original art. I do have the slides sitting around somewhere, but I don’t know where.
The more and more I think about it, I think why didn’t they try the back liftgate to get out. Wouldn’t that be easier to open than the doors? Especially early on when the van has not been fully submerged.
I’m more than a little surprised no one has mentioned kicking out the rear glass panel. I’d always heard that they’re designed to allow you to push or kick them out as a means of escape if doors and windows of the vehicle become inoperable. In fact, because of the engine weight toward the front, it’s the rear which may stay elevated longer if submerged and that’s where an air bubble may form. You move to the rear, brace against the seat and shove or kick that back window out. Is that not the case?
Don’t know about the kicking out the back part, but, yes, in our class we were told that because of the weight distribution, the air bubble usually forms at the back of the car. It seems to me the highest percentage shot to get out of the situation is simply to open the door once pressure equalizes or go out the front window.
Top Gear tried this in a swimming pool and the water shorted out the electric windows. And the water pressure on the outside of the car was so much that Hammond couldn’t get the door open until several seconds after the car had hit the bottom and the inside pressure equalized. By which point he’d run out of air and been given oxygen by the rescue diver in the back seat. He was able to get out on the second try by opening the door right when the car hit the water but said it wrenched his arm. I imagine it would be that much harder for a woman.
They suspended the car with a small crane and dropped it in, though, rather than driving in from the side. That may change things.
Interesting. According to the safety instructors we worked with, the electrical should last a few minutes after hitting the water. The car the demonstration was performed on, though, was manual doors and manual windows.
I think that was Mythbusters’ conclusion, too, in their experiment.
I suspect since this happened at night, in the fog, they might have been a little disoriented as to what had happened, and what was going on until it was too late.
There was a (somewhat) local story a couple of years ago in which a woman and her daughter ran into a lake. She had just had an argument with her boyfriend, and left in an agitated state of mind, her 12ish-year-old severely handicapped daughter with her. Not being really familiar with her boyfriend’s area, she took off during a heavy rain, missed a turn, and went into the lake. When they recovered the car, they found her in the back seat, with her daughter’s head cradled in her lap. As I recall, at least one window was rolled down, and the rescuers thought she could have crawled out–but apparently she wasn’t going to leave without her daughter.
One of them had enough time and air to place a call for help. I wonder where they were in the vehicle at that point. Was it still afloat, when they could have just popped open a window, but they assumed this was a “please come haul out our car” incident until it suddenly stopped floating? Or had they retreated to the back as it was nose down and losing air? (Either way, it’s a bad choice to place a call.)