Sep 18 2007
Smartcar accident photos.. but not quite.
I recently received a series of photos by email of a fatal crash between a SmartCar and a truck. The more graphic photos (those showing the victim) I’ve failed to include here, but if you’re curious a google search should find them no problem. I was initially interested because my Father and Step-Mom own a smart car.
Now I’m no Auto-phile, but the small portion of the vehicle remaining intact did not appear to be a SmartCar as I had seen them, the spare tire mounted on the rear of the car seemed out of place. A second look shows the name of the car in the first photo (albeit only partially visible due to the amount of damage) stencilled across the vehicle below the doors. It appears to be, and was verified by a little googling, a Volkswagen Crossfox.
Not that the mistaken identity of the vehicle type makes the photos any less horrific, but this should serve as another example of taking the stuff that arrives in your inbox with a grain of salt before randomly forwarding it.
Tsk tsk.
That’s a rough hit, sorry for the loss of live to the survivors I know that it was not your loss, but it is still a loss.
The British show Top Gear slammed a Smart car in to a Jersey barrier at 70 MPH and about a 45 deg angle of attack. And while the car did not look like much later, the doors still opened (with just a little force) but the passenger area of the car was fine.
I would not worry about being in a smart car I don’t think they are any less safe then the other micro cars.
Just my 2 cents.
Agreed.
The tragedy is the main reason I’ve failed to include the pictures of the victim (which are quite graphic), not because those that read this blog would be shocked, disgusted or offended by the pictures themselves, but rather that they’d be shock, disgusted or offended by the voyeuristic nature of such photos.
Quite frankly ANY passenger car that slams head first into a transport truck is going to fare poorly from the encounter. I spoke with my Dad about this when I got the photos, and my feeling was that this is another example of internet schadenfruede.
FYI, here is the Smart space frame:
http://auto.howstuffworks.com/smart-car1.htm
and the Top Gear crash test:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biYLn47VwJs
Somebody seriously sent these around thinking they’d be some kind of a revelation? Unless I’m missing something the “warning” appears to be that switching to the oncoming lanes and ramming a rig head-on will destroy a SmartCar/VW Crossfox. If you need to be told that you shouldn’t be driving.
The shame is the disrespect to the victims in having the accident turned into another internet smear campaign.
I’m a little confused, is the implication that “Smart cars” aren’t safe?
It would seem, just about any car versus a big rig head on is going to be grim.
If someone sent you these pictures, for any other reason than to “Warn you about the dangers of stopping a big rig, with a compact car,” I think the point is moot.
There are pictures of 6500 lbs pickup trucks that have been “Vaporized” by 18 wheelers. I’ve seen a H1 vs. a loaded fuel truck, the hummer only recognizable by markings on one wheel.
The story is always the same, wrong place, wrong time.
Maybe this strikes a little close to home, Kd has a smart car, Dad drives a Golf, and I just sold the “Mean-o” to buy a compact.
Don’t fear the truckers, it’s the “Soccer Moms” (ON THEIR CELL PHONES) that’ll get you!
As far as I know, no supercompact is particularly safe. Wouldn’t expect the Smart to be any worse than the rest, nor would I expect any of them to be survivable in a head-on with a tractor/trailer rig even at lower-than-freeway speeds.
Then again, I wouldn’t trust any vehicle to be survivable in such a crash … though I’d rather be in my ancient Mercedes sedan than in a Smart in pretty much any collision I can think of.
When it comes to tractor-trailors and anything smaller its going to be ugly. Even more so with the sub-compact cars and motorcycles. This is why I’m always to the left or right and far infront or behind the big boys.
Ayup.
Car meets truck, car suffers significant field modifications, photographers descend, internet circulates photos, conclussion is as you’d expect. Don’t drive your car into a transport truck.
Not relevant to this particular post, but relevant perhaps to Mugwug’s site as a whole:
ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/070918/health/peru_health_offbeat
“villagers suffer mysterious illness after meteorite crash”
Everybody keep their powder dry.
Well if this is how it’s all going to start,
I should probably mention that I will be making my way up North.
Texas is nice to live in, but, I’m not going to die here.
Erik, don’t shoot me when I knock on the door.
The correct “Identification Phrase” is “Flash/Thunder”,
something that always bugged me about S.P.R.
It took me quite a while to finally identify the car and find this page, but I searched after actually receiving this as an email. It states, “WHY YOU SHOULD NOT BE TEXTING OR USING YOUR CELL PHONE WHILE DRIVING?” “THIS IS WHY…” “this…”
<photo? “AND THIS …” and you get the idea. Anyway, not that it REALLy matters to most people what he was doing, I was just curious if this guy actually died while using his phone. I know a lot of people will take stuff like this and run with it to make it fit their cause or agenda. Anyway, I just thought I’d add in my 2 cents of experience with the email.
… And wow, I hope his family was aware when these horrible pictures began to be circulated…
I was never able to adequately source the photo, so never got any back story on how, when or why the collision occured. The driver may well have been talking on a cell, but it would appear to be speculation.
Sad none the less.
Yes, sad. Very sad. And sad also for that truck driver as well. You can tell from the other vehicles at the scene that wherever this is, they drive on the right side of the street, so it’s obviously not the trucks fault, but I know that I would feel horrible knowing that I was involved in that to whatever degree. Involved and having to have witnessed it just must have been horrible.
Thanks for the reply though. I was just thinking that there must be tons of ‘Don’t do this…’ and ‘Don’t do that…while driving’ emails out there.
But yeah, I found postings of it, but nothing saying what actually happened to this poor guy.
Anyway, thanks again… now I’m going to try to move on with enjoying the Christmas season. Thank you!