What Is The Most Inconceivable Auto Moments You've Witnessed?

"PatBateman" (PatBateman) 09/04/2020 at 17:12 • Filed to: IMPOSSIBRU, story time, PatBateman’s Story Time Extravaganza, STOP READING MY TAGS

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Sometimes, the stars align perfectly, along with the planets, while the moon is in the proper phase. This is when the illogical becomes logic, the impossible comes into being, and we witness something that wouldn’t make the script of even the zaniest movie because we’d all call bullshit on it and walk out of the theater. Here’s my moment:

When I was a senior in high school just west of Austin (LET’S GO CHAPS), I was also a volunteer firefighter for the local fire department. One Saturday night, while I was sleeping at the fire station at about 2 AM, we got toned out for a auto collision call. The dispatcher said, as we were getting out of bed and into our clothes (sorry ladies, we did actually wear clothing under our bunker gear), “this will be a one car accident, car vs house, at 123 Mogul Ave” (not actual address, of course). I knew this road, because some of my friends lived off of it. It is a steep downhill road lined with homes with a cross street that runs across it about 75 yards from the bottom of the hill, which the street then makes an immediate 70 degree left hand turn. The cross street makes a sudden level spot which, if taken at a high enough speed, would make a vehicle lose control and not be able to make the turn at the bottom of the hill.

Before I had even left the bunk room, I turned to my friend and said that the accident was involving Bob Smith’s (not real name) truck. He snickered, because no description of the vehicle had been made, and the odds of me being right were ridiculously astronomical.

You see, Bob Smith was a grade under me, and was a prince among the children of Austin’s most well-healed 1%. His father’s family owned half of the car dealerships in Central Texas, and this kid would literally get a new truck every 3 months. The one he had at that moment was a 1995 Chevy Z-71 Extended Cab Flareside 4x4, with an 8" suspension lift and 40-something inch Super Swampers on it. It was as austentatious (pun intended) as anything else in the student parking lot at our school, making it the most famous truck around.

So as we pulled up to the scene, we all saw a white Chevy monster truck sitting in the terraced lawn of this home at the bottom of the hill. I was 100% correct on the truck, but Bob wasn’t there. We were told that he had apparently gotten drunk and his two also intoxicated friends had decided to take his truck out to see if they could make the turn after hitting that particular bump going across Mogul Avenue at a speed of 60 mph. They could not.

NOW HERE’S THE “AGAINST ALL ODDS” PART:

The truck had done a lot of damage to the front yard, which was terraced downhill to the home from the street. The stone walls that made up the terraces had ripped the bottom of the truck to shreds, bent the frame, and torn out most of the drivetrain from the engine back. But it didn’t actually hurt the house it was touching.

But you know what it did do?

The truck had come to a rest at the perfect angle, at the perfect speed, that the front bumper was touching only one part of the house:it pressed the doorbell button in just enough to make it constantly ring. Ding Dong... Ding Dong... Ding Dong... Ding Dong... That’s what made the homeowners come to the door to find out that a truck had come through their front lawn. They opened their door to stare at the grill of a spoiled party kid’s stolen brodozer.

That’s my story. What’s yours?

Jay, the practical enthusiast > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 17:30

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I was doing 35mph on the highway because of rain. It was the middle of the day but the rain was so thick it was dark. A car passed me doing about 70 right before the road curved down to the right. I saw headlights, no headlights, headlights, no headlights, headlights, no headlights, and finally headlights again. I slowed down even more as I came up on the car now facing me in my lane on the highway. He had done at least 3 complete 360s. Somehow he stayed on the road and didn’t hit the barriers. His car was perfectly fine even if he wasn’t.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 17:32

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That is, well almost unbelievable. Almost as unbelievable as that tire pushing a doorbell story on the FP except way better because of the first hand account.

My most unbelievable story would have to be this:

Setting: a heavily trafficked and fast flowing suburban interstate; only 5 lanes I believe

Vehicle: my dad’s 2002 Toyota Tundra TRD. The TRD factory lift and wider track might have saved me here.

Driving home from, well, something in the truck from before I had my own car. I had been driving long enough to know to act decisively in an emergency but before I had my own car and was driving regularly. Well, I was following an Isuzu NPR box truck with about a 4 second gap. Suddenly, the truck swerved violently into a narrow gap in traffic to the left.

What it revealed was a seemingly massive stack of pallets around 3 high rapidly approaching and seemingly nowhere for me to avoid them. Of course I glanced over my right shoulder to check for cars as I slammed on the brakes in case I couldn’t get over. I had to pick a direction and I chose poorly. There was a small gap but the speed difference made it unsafe for me to get over. There was no one to my left.

CRACK! I impacted the pallets at about 30 mph. It wasn’t as hard an impact as I expected but it still shook me. I glanced in my rearview mirror as I coasted away from the wreckage to see the remnants of one flying 20 or more feet in the air. The rear tire had kicked it up seemingly impossibly high in the air.

The sedan following behind me of course couldn’t see over me but their panic stop was well underway by the time I saw them. They came to a full stop in the middle of the interstate as the pallet landed maybe an inch at most in front of their bumper. I didn’t see what happened next but there was no damage to the truck and for that I am grateful.

Future next gen S2000 owner > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 17:32

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I pulled a complete 360 after hitting some black ice right in front of an old girlfriends house. Her old man apparently saw the whole thing. He thought it was funny. Thank god.

The Murano Cross Cabriolet making it into production is a close second.

Mercedes Streeter > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 17:33

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Maybe not “inconceivable” but I have a couple “crazy lucky” stories.

Set the scene: It’s early 2015, maybe late 2014 or so...all that matters is that a heavy snowstorm had just blown through. I decided to drive my smart to work without traction control on to get some drifting action. This was a mistake.

I was driving maybe a half car length ahead of a semi. At some point, a pothole hidden under the blanket of snow caught the right front wheel. This normally wouldn’t be an issue as the computers would automatically stop any funny business, but I have the computers disabled. In an instant the car began a spin. That was it, I’m semi food.

Nope. Somehow the spin initiated by the pothole and my motion on the throttle and steering resulted in a perfect 360 spin within my lane. I saw the trucker hard on his brakes in the mirror while I felt like an accidental superhero.

Set the scene: It’s fall 2011 and I have my first car, a 2001 Kia Rio. As I was coming home from a friend’s house late at night I came upon a light that was stale green just turning yellow , 35mph zone . On the lead-up to the light something told me to STOP, so I slammed on my brakes literally the moment the yellow illuminated. And a couple seconds later before the yellow finished a white Escalade rocketed through the intersection and blowing a red , occupying the space I would have had I not stopped. Still no idea what made me think to stop, but I’m glad I did.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 17:34

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For me, it might have been watching two caravans in a murder-suicide pact in my rearview mirror. An area with a middle turn lane that turned into a left turn; I was turning left, and the caravan right behind me moved into the center turn lane in anticipation of turning left right as the other caravan tried to go into the (coming) middle turn lane to turn to *his* left.

(me in blue, Caravans in green):

They hit each other in seemingly perfect unison, corner to corner, with both back right corners off the ground, and spun and partly blocked the road in both directions.

Just Jeepin' > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 17:44

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Mine is less dramatic from a physics standpoint, but my oddest driving experience involved a woman running down the middle of an interstate highway after midnight.

I wrote about it, which ALL OF YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE TOO.

https://oppositelock.kinja.com/road-rage-of-a-different-sort-1828308419

HammerheadFistpunch > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 17:46

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I think it’ s pretty incredible semi trucks keep running the same 3 way stop at a super popular pedestrian intersection at a very popular summer destination and no one has died or even been injured.

https://www.fox13now.com/2019/08/20/another-semitrailer-crashes-at-busy-garden-city-intersection/

Seriously they are going into a parking lot for the busiest part of town for people congregating.  

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > HammerheadFistpunch 09/04/2020 at 17:49

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Now that’s incredible. Incredibly fortunate, but still incredible.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > Mercedes Streeter 09/04/2020 at 17:52

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Those are some crazy stories. I’ve just decided that the driver next to me is an idiot and doesn’t know how to driver across an off center intersection multiple times and fall into line behind them as they plow into my lane MULTIPLE TIMES and I’ve never been wrong. 

CivicWagonEngineer > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 17:53

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I totaled my Dad’s van because the tire blew out. Sounds harmless, right? Well the tire decided that it wanted to fling up into the fender liner and rip out all of the wire harness hidden above. My dad is still angry about it almost 10 years later.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 09/04/2020 at 17:54

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Bonus points for graphic

HammerheadFistpunch > Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available 09/04/2020 at 17:58

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its stupidity at its finest. They are building a runaway truck ramp and they put in a light but wont address why semi trucks are a regular occurance in this small town (hint: it’ s about weigh stations)

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > Just Jeepin' 09/04/2020 at 17:59

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Both of those stories are absolutely insane. You drove the wrong way instead of backing?

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > HammerheadFistpunch 09/04/2020 at 18:01

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Well, the town probably can’t do anything about the weigh station that belongs to the county. They should put in an 11'8" bridge.

Just Jeepin' > Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available 09/04/2020 at 18:02

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Yep. There was no traffic and the woman was being chased. If I had backed up I could have easily hit one of them in the dark , could have been too slow to stop an attack...pulling a u-turn was the least bad option.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > Just Jeepin' 09/04/2020 at 18:02

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Granted. I’m used to lit freeways and in the moment that might have been the least dangerous. 

HammerheadFistpunch > Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available 09/04/2020 at 18:07

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No, the trouble is that there isn’t a weigh station, they all come up and over a huge mountain pass and strait into a small summer town (overloaded) to bypass the weigh station for the state line that is a few miles up the road from the town.

subexpression > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 18:14

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I know nobody’s going to believe this one, but... I saw somebody drive a Mustang like a responsible adult without hitting anything or anyone.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > HammerheadFistpunch 09/04/2020 at 18:15

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Yeah I see your point. I wouldn’t want overloaded semis driving through my small  off season town either.

EL_ULY > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 18:28

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Fell asleep in my e36 M3, went off the road and juuuuuust missed 3 power lines while skidding sideways. They were just shy of kissing my front bumper. I was going like 80mph  sideways on wet grass. No scratches , no damage and now wide awake lol

ranwhenparked > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 18:42

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Nothing that crazy, but I drive 40-50k a year between work and personal, and hardly a day goes by without one or two WTF moments.

I guess the craziest was when I was working as a district executive for a youth serving nonprofit that begins with a B and ends with an A, and was coming home from an evening meeting around 11pm or so. Stopped at a red light at a busy intersection, and heard a revving engine and then a loud crack, all I saw was a silver blur go past the front of me. Looked over, and a silver Camry had knocked out a street sign, hopped a curb, and smashed into a pump at a gas station across the street, must have flown through the intersection at at least 80, this was a 45mph zone. Against my better judgement, I pulled in to see if there was anything I could do, but the person behind the wheel seemed fine, because he started yelling obscenities and telling me to go the f away, heard sirens, so I left. The cashier from the gas station was standing around too.

Another time driving from Bucks County PA up to Albany, somewhere in suburbia of central New Jersey, I coasted down to a stop at a red light, and a guy on a Harley behind me wasn't paying attention, jerked his handlebars and whipped past me on the left, laying it down and sliding through the intersection. Overweight, 50-60 something, one of those decorative helmets that doesn't really protect anything, but at least he was wearing dad jeans and not the basketball shorts and flip flops a lot of bikers seem to favor these days. He was fine, but his bike took a lot of damage. Wasn't a sudden stop or anything, but he had been tailgating for miles. No passing lane and heavy traffic, guess he thought the cars in front of me would magically disappear if he just rode my bumper a little more.

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 18:50

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1. Driving home from Christmas dinner with my mom and she was driving her Mazda MX-6. Cruising along dark Montana highways between 70 and 80 mph. We see lights behind the car and she pulls over. A panting Montana highway patrol office was convened there was some kind of emergency Because took him 15 miles to catch up with my mom. She apologized, and he sent us on our way without a ticket. My mom knows how to handle a car.

2. I was in one of my previous Datsun 240Z cars and was doing about 90 up a good hill outside of Butte Montana on I-90. I thought I saw a a highway patrol turn in the median behind me but I was already a mile past that point now at 100+ mph... anyway a slightly sweeting highway patrol office eventually caught up to me and the reason he pulled me over was he couldn’t see my front plate. So I bent it back down and he sent me on my way. Reasonable and prudent for the win.

phenotyp > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 19:07

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I dunno, man, I live in Austin. Doesn’t matter what road, or what kind of road. I wish I’d had a dashcam for my whole life, this place makes Russian dashcam videos look pretty tame and sane.

Roadkilled > PatBateman 09/04/2020 at 19:29

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I was driving through Clayton Missouri, heading south on Big Bend. I came to a stop at Wydown in the middle lane. There was a car to my right, and a car to my left in the left turn lane.

Apparently, the idiots on either side of me simultaneously realized they needed to turn onto Wydown the opposite direction of the side of the road they were on.

The light turned green followed by both drivers cutting in front of me. The driver in the right lane gunned the engine to get in front of me to make a left turn. The driver in the left turn lane accelerated to get around me to make a right turn. Both drivers crossed in front of me, missed each other by inches and cleared the intersection before any other traffic could get started.

bison78 > Future next gen S2000 owner 09/04/2020 at 22:41

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I saw 3 cars in the process of doing 360s over the space of about 1 mile. The cars were on the other side of the motorway ( highway) and this was a particularly bad winter. I also managed a 360 on ice that winter, in a car that I had borrowed from  my then-employer: Lucas. Apparently, I smashed all 4 headlights, which I did not notice until after I returned the car the next day.

PatBateman > Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available 09/05/2020 at 07:55

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The story on FP about the tire reminded me.I saw it and thought, “that’s nothing compared to my truck story”.

PatBateman > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 09/05/2020 at 08:06

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Synchronized Caravan Dancing

PatBateman > subexpression 09/05/2020 at 08:09

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I said “inconceivable”, not “truly impossible”.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > Roadkilled 09/05/2020 at 10:25

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Aw, I was expecting insta karma in the form of a head on smash.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > phenotyp 09/05/2020 at 10:28

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Not even one example? I mean my classic suicidal motorcyclist owes me his life story is pretty good too but I’ve got tons and I haven’t even been driving for that long comparatively. Like the time a car passed a semi in a particularly debris filled uphill gore on an on  ramp that was rapidly growing smaller before it disappeared. Nearly was forced into the barrier in front of me but the driver managed it somehow.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > ranwhenparked 09/05/2020 at 10:32

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Did you go over to see if he was alright? I'd definitely have a word about tailgating afterwards but then again that's easy to say here in my chair many miles away.

Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available > PatBateman 09/05/2020 at 10:35

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So far you win. My pallet story wasn't great but I've overused the story about the suicidal motorcyclist passing me on the left as I turned left. 

ranwhenparked > Who is the Leader - 404 / Blog No Longer Available 09/05/2020 at 13:09

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Oh yeah, I stopped and got out, he pushed it into a parking lot and called his wife to have her brother bring a trailer to get him, he was fine, embarrassed, but fine