BMW becomes airborne - 5 killed

[kamilyun]

As the father of a young one, this scares the crap out of me.  The driver for sure was the most responsible, and I wonder if any of the passengers thought it wasn't a good idea, maybe spoke up, but only had the others talk him down.

Of course, they all could have thought it was a grand idea, but I've been on a few rides with idiots before and wished I could've gotten out of the car and walked.

Hope I never get a call at 4 am with news like this...

[eskimo2]

Originally posted by kamilyun
As the father of a young one, this scares the crap out of me.  The driver for sure was the most responsible, and I wonder if any of the passengers thought it wasn't a good idea, maybe spoke up, but only had the others talk him down.

Of course, they all could have thought it was a grand idea, but I've been on a few rides with idiots before and wished I could've gotten out of the car and walked.

Hope I never get a call at 4 am with news like this...

I also am more saddened than amused.

[FBplmmr]

When I was 17, I drove off a road at close to 120mph and launched into the air.

I 'launched' on a pile of debris leftover from the dredging of a canal and that crushed the front of the car causing complete darkness. (it was night) .. I had time to think 'whew' as the airborne part was relatively smooth compared to careening through the empty field and I thought it was over.

Then the 'splashdown' occurred and water began pouring in the windows, at this I exclaimed 'oh sh--!'


I released my seatbelt and swam out the window. (the buoyancy of a 71 Pontiac is not exemplary)  


In my panic it did not occur to me that if I stopped swimming I would float to the top and it took a bit to spot a light on the surface. (a security light from a nearby house)

I 'swam to the light' and by the time I broke surface only a trace of the trunk was visible.

It was a Pontiac LeMans Sport and on the trunk the word 'Sport' was missing the 'S' so the starboard side of the trunk always read 'port' and we always laughed about that before the accident. (my Dad used to joke 'ya buy that jalopy from McHales Navy?'

So the last I saw of my high school hotrod before it was craned up was 'port' and I immediately thought to myself ' no starboard!'

Darwin just missed me on that one.



(i have  few pictures I could scan if anyones interested. I was gonna scan the car anyway for the post your ride thread)

(please also note that I did not intend by my post to make light in any way the tragedy that occurred  with the 5 people in the BMW, but I thought I would share a story about what  kids do when they are young and reckless)

[balance1]

Originally posted by Vulcan
someones been watching Dukes of Hazard reruns.

they just didnt have their facts straight, ya see if they were only in a certain orange dodge charger with a cool horn they woulda been fine.....::sigh:: its allways a shame to see 'em go so young  

Well its one helluva way to go!

EDIT:curses Vulcan you beat me to it!

[trax1]

I was young & reckless when I had my accident, 2 weeks outta high school, 19 and thought nothing bad could ever happen to me, was me and 2 friends and I took my fathers 95 Grand Prix with out him knowing, my car was a peice of crap 83 Ford Fairmont, was on my way to a girlfriends house and took a short cut through an unincorporated town, so the road was a narrow 2 mile stretch, as soon as I turned on to it I floored it, last I saw the gage was at 100mph, there was a slight incline in the road and never saw a car coming over the other side, I had only a split second to react, so I jerked the wheel to the right, then back to the left, the side of the road was gravel and the car lost traction and went into a 180 spin, I just remember this feeling of dread coming over me, then nothing, I'm told the car flipped several times launching atleast 12 ft up bouncing off trees, luckily everyone with me walked away with minor injuries, I wasn't so lucky, the car ejected me then rolled over me, left me in a wheelchair and no use of my right arm.  No one in the car told me to slow down or anything, like I said we were young & reckless.

[eskimo2]

Originally posted by FBplmmr
When I was 17, I drove off a road at close to 120mph and launched into the air.

I 'launched' on a pile of debris leftover from the dredging of a canal and that crushed the front of the car causing complete darkness. (it was night) .. I had time to think 'whew' as the airborne part was relatively smooth compared to careening through the empty field and I thought it was over.

Then the 'splashdown' occurred and water began pouring in the windows, at this I exclaimed 'oh sh--!'


I released my seatbelt and swam out the window. (the buoyancy of a 71 Pontiac is not exemplary)  


In my panic it did not occur to me that if I stopped swimming I would float to the top and it took a bit to spot a light on the surface. (a security light from a nearby house)

I 'swam to the light' and by the time I broke surface only a trace of the trunk was visible.

It was a Pontiac LeMans Sport and on the trunk the word 'Sport' was missing the 'S' so the starboard side of the trunk always read 'port' and we always laughed about that before the accident. (my Dad used to joke 'ya buy that jalopy from McHales Navy?'

So the last I saw of my high school hotrod before it was craned up was 'port' and I immediately thought to myself ' no starboard!'

Darwin just missed me on that one.



(i have  few pictures I could scan if anyones interested. I was gonna scan the car anyway for the post your ride thread)

(please also note that I did not intend by my post to make light in any way the tragedy that occurred  with the 5 people in the BMW, but I thought I would share a story about what  kids do when they are young and reckless)

HOLY COW!

Please do scan and post!

[Vulcan]

Anyone got a ballastics computer that can figure out what speed you'd be at to make a 200 feet with an 80 foot drop?

[eskimo2]

Originally posted by Vulcan
Anyone got a ballastics computer that can figure out what speed you'd be at to make a 200 feet with an 80 foot drop?

The problem is that the car launched off a dirt mound, so it went up to a certain elevation, then dropped back down to its take off level and then kept dropping another 65 feet.  That means that there is a wide band of solutions.  Had the car launched off of level ground, there would only be one solution.

[Vulcan]

Originally posted by eskimo2
The problem is that the car launched off a dirt mound, so it went up to a certain elevation, then dropped back down to its take off level and then kept dropping another 65 feet.  That means that there is a wide band of solutions.  Had the car launched off of level ground, there would only be one solution.

Well lets start with a flat launch, then maybe a few choice solutions such as 10, 20 and 30 degrees

[kamilyun]

With a flat launch, drop of 80 feet, distance of 200 feet, I come up with only 60 mph.

d (vert) = 1/2 at^2 = 80 ft = 26 meters = 1/2 10 m/s^2 x t^2

5.2 = t^2

t = 2.3 s

d (horiz) = vt, v = d/t = 200 feet/2.3s x 60 s/m x 60 m/h / 5280 ft/mile is about 60 mph

I think adding the ramp would only increase the time they were in the air b/c you'd have to add a v x t x tangent (angle) factor to the original equation:

d (vert) = v (horiz) x t x tangent(angle) - 1/2 at^2

This would increase the amount of time spent in the air, which would effectively decrease the overall speed since a larger t = smaller velocity from the 2nd equation.

So I'm pretty sure that if my math is correct, then 60 mph was the max speed they were doing.

Just read that they hit 15 feet above the ground, so that changes it slightly...

68 mph roughly, but assumed only 10m/s^2 and rounded the meters/feet conversion, so may as well say 70 mph.

[JB73]

as someone who has intentionally jumped a car at over 80mph I can tell you, they drop a LOT faster than you'd think.

imagine if you will the following road


at the crest is a railroad track. many many dumb fools took the jump going left to right, because the road is a good mile before the tracks. many many dumb fools put grooves in the concrete on the right "uphill" part where their car bottomed out.

we learned about this from an upperclassman in high school. he had a Polaroid of his VW Jetta about 6 feet off the ground jumping over a guy lying in the road (that was a right to left jump)

if you look from above the tracks were about 1/3 mile from a turn


I hit this multiple times from both directions in my 1980 Monte Carlo to much fun, and damage to the car especially the time I like many other morons landed on the uphill from the left to the right. that time I was about 70 when I hit it.


so one genius night my buddy in his Mitsubishi Eclipse decided we'd hit it, with me in the passenger, another friend in the back seat. I should mention the street running from top to bottom is one of the biggest downhills I have ever driven personally. about 2 miles from this spot it must drop 500 feet in a short distance. the fastest I have ever drive is the bottom, about 125 I am guessing as my speedometer stopped at 80, and I went around back to the 10 MPH.

So we hit it a few times in prep for the big event, both ways, feeling out what we'd do, and guessing our landing spot. Thinking that the small incline coming from left to right wouldn't get us past the incline even with a mile run up we concentrated on how to get speed in the short run from the right.

For fun we raced down that big hill I mentioned, the slowed down and practiced taking that turn as fast as possible, using wrong lanes and all, blind corner, MAN that was just part of the stupidity happening 3 AM that night.

We went around the corner at best about 35, and gunned it. we hit just over 90mph.

You'd never think the uneven distribution of passenger weight in a car would make it tilt in air. The rear passenger was on the passenger (right) side.

We cleared almost the whole span on the left, but did land on the uphill... first thing to touch back down? the front right tire, by a LOT. it threw the steering wheel to the right, snapped a tie rod, and thank God the driver slammed the gas and yanked left. We were dead center of the road when we hit, and when we finally got control of the car we had hit the ground, careened into the tiny shoulder on the right, missed a telephone pole by 5 feet, skidded to the left shoulder, made tire marks in someone's lawn, and left some metal and oil on the road.


Sorry but the worst that happened was the rear passenger had a bump on his head from hitting the ceiling  for about a week. Yes not a single one of us had a seat belt on either.



That was 1992 and I have never considered "jumping" a passenger car since.



Scene of the crime:
http://maps.google.com/maps?client=firefox-a&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=43.128391,-88.134902&spn=0.000469,0.001695&t=h&z=20&om=0


they have since re-paved the road, and even trying you can't get air anyway.

[eskimo2]

I’ve owned over 50 cars; many of them were beaters bought for the purpose of trashing and jumping.  

One time I got a VW bus in the air with 7 passengers aboard.

One time I busted a VW bug’s transaxle in half on a landing.

My brother measured my “bounce” once: 35 feet.  That was after the initial jump and landing on dirt the car sprung back into the air and hopped another 35 feet.

I was a passenger in a Subaru wagon once that landed on its nose; afterwards the entire front clip pointed down about 30 degrees.  The headlights pointed only a few feet in front of the car.

I tried to jump a sofa in a POS Fiat; I landed/mushed onto it and the silly car stopped and was high centered.

My biggest jump was in Britain’s Lake District in 1987 in a rental Ford Fiesta.  It was a one lane paved road on a mountain; you could see for a couple miles into a valley below so I could see that there were no cars coming (I turned around when I saw how awesome a jump it was).  The landing was on a 25 degree downhill.  We hit so hard that all four lower shock points were bent back, the muffler was mashed to about half it thickness and some of the low points of the floor pan were beat and scraped to bare metal.  That car had 4,500 miles on it when we got it and it drove worse than a car with 200,000 neglected miles.  It was ruined, but looked fine.  

One time I let a buddy drive my $25 auction car.  He hit a fire hydrant in mid air, busted it off and mashed the LF wheel and suspension completely above the floor pan.  It still could sort of drive on three wheels.

Here’s my $50 Chevy LUV:






Here's me trashing an old Caddy:
http://hallbuzz.com/movies/alaska/cadillac_style.wmv

Here's me trashing an old Toyota:
http://hallbuzz.com/movies/alaska/toyota.wmv

[Pooh21]

The kid who crashed made a thread  on an m5 board a few days ago.

One of the responses included."My only bit of advice matey - If you crash in a big way expect to be on the news. "

All the stupid crap you do as a brainless 18y/o mine was going 110 down a desert road in Arizona and catching air on a jump. I've wrecked that car after that as well. The only thing is I never had passangers doing that crap.

My Rabbit has a program I can load into the computer for valet mode. its golf cart mode. If I ever have crumbcrunchers. They are getting a GPS locator hidden in their car and a rechipped computer for 55 max.

[Thruster]

80 foot drop between the end of the runway and the ground?

Its been a long time but I can't recall seeing a hill in central Florida much less an 80 ft. cliff.

I gotta be missing something.

[culero]

Originally posted by JB73
as someone who has intentionally jumped a car at over 80mph I can tell you, they drop a LOT faster than you'd think.
snip

Maybe than faster you might think. Actually, there's physics N stuff involved that tell pretty much exactly how fast the car is gonna drop