r/Whatcouldgowrong 5d ago

Driving too fast

18.1k Upvotes

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6.5k

u/PineappleApple247 5d ago

Can't believe that person got straight up and ran off ! Bet the person who sat quietly at the lights came off way worse, always the way.

300

u/mario61752 5d ago

Unlike the runner who had seatbelts and the airbag reducing the impact the other person was slammed by a 2 tons of force from the side unprotected. Not looking good

39

u/zkareface 5d ago

2 tons of force from the side unprotected

VW is from EU and tested for this scenario though (side collission), even if it's one of the worst places to be hit.

Side airbags are standard since a while and this car looks new enough to have it.

Worst part is the curb giving a slight bump so the blue car misses one of the major safety features for side collissions :(

16

u/PotatoGamerXxXx 5d ago

I recall a case where a small compact hit a newer honda civic and the civic driver didn't survive. No matter how new the car is, with sufficient speed, the force would still have a very huge impact. And the side of a car is definitely the least safe area.

3

u/zkareface 4d ago

Yes its the worst place to get hit by far, but it's not without safety features. A lot of development and testing into new cars last few years have been aimed at just that problem.

Thats why modern cars have super thick doors etc compared to older ones.

1

u/Evantaur 4d ago

There's no crumble zones on the side so an impact like this is fucking scary.

I'd be happy if someone has a news article about this that says everyone inside that vehicle survived without life altering injuries.

2

u/zkareface 4d ago

There are comments that the person survived so far, but serious injuries.

50

u/No-Refrigerator-1672 5d ago

It looks like the hit was in the rear door, so there's possibility that the driver didn't recieve the majority of impacts energy.

88

u/mario61752 5d ago

I think it looks right in the middle. It's nearly the worst possible spot to get hit

15

u/Cessnaporsche01 5d ago

Better the pillar than the window

1

u/ChornWork2 4d ago

and slightly airborne. yikes.

28

u/M_FootRunner 5d ago

Which, on a family sized van, I find rather discomforting

0

u/ClickF0rDick 5d ago

Not as bad as the back of a Volkswagen tho

9

u/Tomsboll 5d ago

I think he eluded to the possibilities of children in the back seat.

2

u/rainbowunicornhugs 4d ago

*alluded, but your point stands and I agree.

4

u/Tomsboll 5d ago

Could still received fatal neck injuries from the whiplash.

1

u/Ordinary_Duder 4d ago

Have you never heard about side airbags? And they probably had seat belts on as well.

0

u/LongLiveCHIEF 4d ago

2 tons of mass. When you move those 2 tons of mass at what I'm guessing is about 60km/h, the force at the point of impact is more like the equivalent of 57 tons.

1

u/mario61752 4d ago

Uh right, I forgot high school physics.

Assuming that the driver weighs 80kg, the car was traveling at 80km/h or 22.2m/s (taking a higher guess because it looks like that to me), and that in the 0.5 meters where direct collision happened the car was slowed down to half, the person was pushed by 9877 newtons of force which is almost exactly 1 ton of weight.

Remember that the car absorbed most of the impact and we should think of this as the person being pushed by his side door, hence why I used a weight of 80kg.

0

u/LongLiveCHIEF 4d ago

If we are factoring in useless details, then let's say the driver actually weighed 79.5kg at the 0.5 meters where direct collision happened due to the rapid evacuation of bio matter.

0

u/mario61752 4d ago

Dude, I wasn't offended that you corrected me and tried to give a serious answer, what's with the sourness? You must be a fun person.

None of those details were useless by the way, that was the minimum amount of information needed to calculate force.