So thankful that you and the woman are ok.
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Truly glad this was not a tragedy. Thank you, John W. Hetrick, may your airbags always be with us and may they always deploy when needed.
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So glad you werenât seriously hurt.
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Stay well. Those babies are going to be needing you soon.
Donât worry about the forge, I hear the packaging was well tested before they put any production models in. In fact you should save the box, and use it in place of a car seat, imoâŚ
(Donât use it as a car seat)
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Thank goodness you are OK and most importantly your babies were not in the car. Both facts are true miracles. Makes you appreciate what is important in life, the babies, your wife and of course your soon to arrive GF.
Yeah, I was in a similar accident on my way into call where I was t-boned, and modern cars are truly amazing compared even to cars from the 1990s let alone older (how did we survive??), and afterwards you realize the car parts sacrificed themselves to keep you safe. All the airbags, crumple zones, seat belt tensioners, high-strength steel cages, etc all worked and all I ended up with was a rug burn on my arm from the airbag (and made it into call only 2 hours late!). Even more miraculous in hindsight was I had of course a recalled takata airbag, so escaped getting killed by shrapnel. You definitely hug your kids when you get home after that!
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seriously! when gas went crazy a few years ago i remember prices on used geo metros went up because theyâre so fuel efficient (because they are small, weigh little, and not that safe in comparison) and i remember thinking eesh, i wouldnât want to have to make that trade-off.
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That and the increase in the use of seatbelts have made cars incredibly safe. I started on our volunteer ambulance squad in the early 80s and since I was on weekend nights got mostly car accidents. Serious trauma was the rule of any call. Now itâs fairly rare to get life-threatening injuries in car vs car accidents. Truck vs cars still have the physics of an 80,000 pound missile impacting a 3,000 pound one controlling the outcome.
General soreness the next day is to be expected - you just got beaten up by a car. But it passes pretty quick - way faster than broken bones 
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What an incredible blessing to you and your family that it went the way it did. Your story chilled my heart. Thank all thatâs good that youâre all safe.
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Wow! Iâm glad your angel was with you! Get well soon so you can adore this babies even more!
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Wow, what a crazy time this has been for you. You have been blessed in so many ways!
I investigate collisions for a living and the safety features of modern vehicles are something most folks take for granted. The engineering that keeps us safe is really astounding. I have people complaining all the time about how much damage a seemingly minor impact will cause. I point out that their crumpled vehicle is the very reason they can stand there and rant and rave about torn metal. Yeah, itâs expensive to fix, but still cheaper than medical bills or funeral costs.
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seriously. iâve never begrudged the car damage (aside from being generally upset) in the few accidents iâve been in because it means iâm not dead. yes, they donât build them like they used to, to which i often reply, âthank god.â
iâm reminded of that just last night; on my way to a pen turning demonstration i had to drive through an accident that had just happened, and a canada post mail van just completely demolished a sedan. but the people inside looked to be reasonably sound.
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Iâm sure most folks have seen this video, but old cars were built heavy because steel was way weaker and they hadnât considered crash safety in any scientific manner. The Malibu is totaled but the interior is basically pristine.
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Seen that before but itâs still so hard to watch the view inside the Bel AIr.
Science!!!
The collapse of the A pillar is pretty brutal in the Bel Air.
Still, I couldnât bring myself to drive todayâs Malibu or (what they call) an Impala, but then again I wouldnât be driving a 50s or 60s anything as a daily driver.
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from a style/functionality reason, sure. From a safety metric it is extremely safe.
A pristine interior may not necessarily be a good thing for the passengers. The energy has to go somewhere. (Back in the early days of airliners, there were a bunch of crashes where the fuselage was intact but not any of the passengers â apparently at last they got funding for a drop test and found that the fuselage was deforming when it hit the ground, but not stressed past its elastic limit, so it then un-deformed.)
While you are correct, that the old âbuild it like a tankâ was a bad idea, that does not apply here, because it is designed with multiple staged crumple zones and force spreading to move the collision force to the outside, while the passenger cage is made of high strength steel to prevent large object penetration, with energy absorption via air bags and pretensioning seat belts. When you watch the FEA of the collision simulations it is amazing how good they have gotten with preserving the passenger cage while the rest of the car is rapidly sacrificing itself to absorb energy.
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I have mixed feelings about the current state of vehicle manufacturing. Safety is good, sure. Pedestrian protection is good. Non-repairable âengineered to failâ throwaway parts, planned obsolescence, increasing driver distractions, encouraging poor driving techniques through automated systems⌠not so good IMHO. There plenty of reasons that I sold my post-2000 vehicles and now have a '98 and a '99.
I used to have a jeep XJ with bumpers made from 1/2" and 1/4" steel plate, and DOM tube. It was built to regularly survive a trail called Carnage in the Lefthand Canyon OHV area (now in a state of permanent âtemporaryâ closure after the flood of '13) by a guy who does competitive rock-racing.
I was rear-ended while stopped at a red light by a distracted driver in a Geo. It went full crumple, radiator tacoâd, headlights pointing in at each other, hood looked like a lasagna noodle, frame bent, windshield in a thousand pieces, airbags deployed. Total loss.
I wiped some flakes of Geo-Green off of my bumper, and was mildly annoyed that I would have to buy a can of spraypaint for touch-up even though I hadnât gone wheeling that day. Drove into a nearby parking lot to wait for the police and insurance folks, while the other driver stood on the sidewalk, waiting for a tow truck, watching traffic try to maneuver around his dead Geo as it poured coolant and oil onto the street.
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Happened to my old issuzu rodeo too, except mine was parked. Distracted construction worked hit it with a new pickup and bounced the rodeo over the curb into a pillar. Guy drove off without a word, one of the shop owners saw it (I was inside where I was working looking the other way. Didnât hear the crunch) came over and told me. I released the ebrake and thumped back into the parking space. Looked for damage. Couldnât distinguish anything new from the other dings that had already been put in it. Saw the truck get towed away leaking 15 minutes later
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When I learned to drive, my family owned only classic cars, and my first ride was a 1958 Chevy Del Rey, which my family thought of as really safe because it was so slow (it was happiest at 35 mph, and maxed out at 55). Later, someone told me, âThose things are definitely safe in a crashâsafe for the car. Get in a collision and theyâll just wipe your brains off the dashboard and sell it to the next guy.â Yeesh.
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