SpudFiles

Last week when I posted the SpudFiles commercial (see here http://www.spudfiles.com/announces/spud ... 25477.html) I mentioned that I had been in an accident that day. I was actually on my way home from work, ready to meet the guy that filmed the commercial.
Needless to say, it took me a while to get home. It was raining and a 15yr old girl, on a learners permit (not good) with no licensed driver with her (illegal) and no valid insurance (x2 illegal) wearing no seat belt (x3 illegal plus she almost went through the windshield) turned straight into me making a left on green at full speed on a very busy road.

I was going about 45mph and did a full 720 spin at least and flew over the curb, through the grass, and sort of into a parking lot. If the curb was any higher I probably could have flipped over. I fully believe the side air bags (that both deployed from overhead and tore open my seats to come out to provide buffers against the doors) saved me from extensive injuries.

RIP my almost new Mazda 3 hatchback. What you don't see are the pics of the other side where my wheels are now horizontal. Was the first car I've ever bought new, and my first real wreck, and my first total auto loss all in one. I had to crawl through the passenger side to get out. It also apparently looked wild enough to make maybe 10 people come running across the road, in the rain, to see if we were alright. It impressed me really to have people trying to get to me in the car, usually people drive right by accidents starring.

Let this be a lesson to the many of you that are new drivers - the learners permit is nothing to fool around with and the rules of the road are actually there for a damn good reason. Seat belts save lives, I may not be posting this right now if I had not mine securely attached. If I didn't try to dodge her so much I would have gone straight into her and possibly ejected her from the car without her seat belt. She could have easily died as could have I. This poor girl now likely won't legally drive until she's 21 or 25, and she was arrested 2 days before her sweet 16 leaving the hospital for all of this.

Airbags ever save anyone here?

Holy #&$%@#$#@$$# man, relieved to know you're alright! My parents say it all the time- it's not my driving they're worried about, it's other people. Everywhere I go I see another friggen idiot who has absolutely no business being behind the wheel. My train horns come in handy very often...

Airbags ever save anyone here?

Luckily they haven't had the opportunity to yet!

At least she was the one who suffered the most... Is insurance going to cover a new car?

Back on August 25 1983 11:35PM there were no seat belt laws, airbags were not mandatory (1st airbag was in 1974 Oldsmobile), and there were no drunk driving laws. 3 reasons I'm wheeling around in a chair since then. Technology and the law and some luck was on your side PCGUY, I'm glad you made it out all right.

How fast was she going? And looking at that little car is why I prefer the larger heavier vehicles.

As if tumblr wasn't reason enough to dislike 15 year old girls. "That poor girl" should have known better.

Hope someone reimburses you for your toy car and you put the money towards investing in a real American truck.

jackssmirkingrevenge wrote:As if tumblr wasn't reason enough to dislike 15 year old girls. "That poor girl" should have known better.

Hope someone reimburses you for your toy car and you put the money towards investing in a real American truck.

You've come a long way from your island bat cave.

mark.f wrote:You've come a long way from your island bat cave.

Literally and figuratively, you wouldn't think that FMJ bloke off spudtech was the same person

I didn't see it then but I see it now. The cake is not a lie

glad you're ok

It was raining and a 15yr old girl

I think the main cause here was that she was a girl. Not to troll but I've seen enough women drivers and while some are as good as men... some just shouldn't be allowed to drive

@POLAND_SPUD. I've seen just as many male drivers as female that shouldn't be allowed on the road. There were probably a hundred different factors that, if changed, could have had a guy hitting him instead.

@PC-GUY. DANG. You were either very lucky or very unlucky, depending on which way you want to look at it. And the moral of the story is, that is why you never buy a brand-new car. They are a magnet for every bad thing on the road. Birds. Deer. Water and ice. Teenage drivers.

Ouch.

PCGUY
Glad you're OK!

Several years ago, my new SUV was rear ended by a drunk traveling at approx. 105 mph....I stepped out of my car without a scratch. I sent an email to the manufacturers customer service, praising their engineering and the structural integrity of my car. Within a few hours, the Vice President of North American Sales called my home and thanked me for the nice letter. He instructed me to go to ANY dealership in North America and pick out another car of my choice...... or tell them what I wanted and he'd have the factory make a custom car for me. I picked the nicest car at my local dealership and only had to pay sales tax. It was a "thank you gift" from the manufacturer.

Maybe you should send Mazda a nice letter. You never know.....it might work.

Glad to hear nothing major happened to you.

mako, only some of them can be bad thing on the road not all of them.

seriously your response is politically correct and all but either you're trolling or your not very experienced driver

POLAND_SPUD wrote:seriously your response is politically correct and all but either you're trolling or your not very experienced driver

I'm... not sure whom your replying to? As far as the girl vs guy driver... maybe if someone found some stats they would say different but unfortunately I too know far too many ladies that can't handle a vehicle at all. I know of guys that are fairly bad too but personally I've at least seen more ladies myself as bad drivers. I'd say the largest factors here were the rain and her lack of experience. That's why your supposed to have a licensed driver with you!

Thank you all for the relief, good to know someone would be missing me hah

Anyways, I'm waiting to hear back from insurance. I'm covered either way, I'm just hoping she had some valid insurance somewhere otherwise I'm out my deductible until they successfully sue her parents.

@jrrdw I had no idea (or memory at least) you had been involved in a bad wreck, I'm sorry to hear that. She was going maybe 15-20mph, she was turning and didn't even attempt to stop just slap right into me as I was driving the other direction on the other side of the road. Even though she wasn't going too fast it's my speed and coming from the opposing direction that did this amount of damage. Her car had very minor damage to the bumper and headlight/hood corner.

@velocity possibly a good idea however it sounds like you had an extremely bad wreck I don't know if mine is that worthy! Glad to see your posting here today however.

To those saying I need more than a toy car, hehe your on the same page as my Dad. However the Mazda 3 hatchback isn't all that tiny really (looks smaller in my pic) and I do commute to work so gas mileage is a big one for me. I'll get an SUV when I need it but to pull me back and fourth to St. Louis every day a midsized car is fine enough for me. Airbags & technology for the win here though!

PCGUY wrote:To those saying I need more than a toy car, hehe your on the same page as my Dad. However the Mazda 3 hatchback isn't all that tiny really (looks smaller in my pic) and I do commute to work so gas mileage is a big one for me.

I would have classed it as a decent mid-sized car before relocating to the North American continent. Now I just look down on these jap imports with disdain from the window of my ram

To those saying I need more than a toy car, hehe your on the same page as my Dad. However the Mazda 3 hatchback isn't all that tiny really (looks smaller in my pic) and I do commute to work so gas mileage is a big one for me. I'll get an SUV when I need it but to pull me back and fourth to St. Louis every day a midsized car is fine enough for me. Airbags & technology for the win here though!

Why do you care about gas mileage?
If my calculations are correct you pay about 64 eurocents for a liter of gasoline.

Now take a look at the prices in the Netherlands:



(euro 95 is gasoline)

If I'd live in the USA I would simply pick the largest car with the largest engine available

I am glad you don't have any serious injuries....
Man it sucks to see that mazda 3 like that, I kinda like hachback cars

Warning slight rant ahead:

Well I can relate in some way, since I live in South Africa home country of major Corruption, we have a problem over here that quite a few individuals simply buy their licence from a corrupt traffic officials, this leads to a situation where there are a quite a few people on the roads that really does not belong on the road.

Now I can say that I am fairly lucky to have never been in a accident while I am behind the wheel, but on my daily commute to collage, Sometimes I have to dodge a few accidents waiting to happen, one particular day comes to mind, on said day, I almost was in 3 separate accidents, all 3 of those happened in a single stretch of road, one person simply ignored a traffic light, the other ignored a stop street, the last cut me off forcing me into a emergency stop.

events like above happens more often then I like, and it has led to me developing somewhat of a road rage issue since I seem to be a magnet for people doing stupid things near me, couple of days ago I was cut off by someone while we were in a turn, the lady simply changed lanes over a solid white line while we were going around a corner, and she also neglected to check her blind spots before changing lane, otherwise she must have seen I was there.

I am seriously thinking about buying myself a dashboard camera so I can record some of this madness.

jackssmirkingrevenge wrote: Hope someone reimburses you for your toy car and you put the money towards investing in a real American truck.

I have a theory about this(and I don't claim it to be accurate but I am going to share it anyway)
I think lots of people nowadays buy large vehicles like suv's, trucks etcetera because it gives them a sense of safety, but I have seen more then enough accidents where the passengers of large vehicles where killed that I know this sense of safety people feel in suv's and large vehicles is a false sense of safety, l live down the road from a few bar's and there was a time when accidents near my house was a common occurrence a year or two ago (I think law enforcement have started to focus a bit on the areas surrounding the bar's so it is a lot better now ) but I have seen quite a few accidents first hand...

anyhow my theory goes as follows drivers of large vehicles feels a lot safer and therefore pays less attention to their driving,
and if they drive in a risky manner, they don't really feel the danger and thus they continue in their ways. the feeling of danger is felt more clearly when driving in a small car, I can tell you I have been in a small car with a friend at 125 MPH (I wasn't driving) and I can tell you, you know very clearly that you are in danger. my point is that when you feel the sensation of speed and danger, it is a great motivator to drive more safely and people driving overly large vehicles don't always have that feeling of danger.