Another one bites the dust, AKA Don't hit a dump truck.

So, my Son's wife was driving on a 4 lane road and a car cut off the car in front of her. She swerved into the median at 65 to miss the car in front of her and lost control of the car. It crossed the median and broadsided a dump truck, traveling the opposite direction at 60+ mph. She hit the truck just in front of the rear axle.

Thank the Lord she didn't get broadsided by the truck or hit the truck sooner and get run completely over by the back axles. She's OK other than a sprained wrist.

The car? Scratch one really nice, 60K mile, 96 Mercury Sable. It was probably the nicest 96 car I've seen in a long time. The truck ran over the drivers front corner of the car and pretty much chopped it off. Both air bags deployed. It's done. The local PD was nice enough to let me go get it so my Son didn't get stuck with a tow bill.

Needless to say it could have been so much worse.

Anyone need some Sable parts? They will be up for sale soon.

Anyone know if a RWD transmission will bolt up to the DOHC Duratec 3.0 V6. Might be kind of interesting stuffed under the hood of the RX-7.

DAAAAAAMN.

I'm sure you can find a transmission to fit. The ranger had a 3.0. A Mazda transmission may fit, but its a bit... truck. I don't know. If I were to see the bolt pattern...

(Glad everyone made it out ok.)

(Here's a bolt pattern list that I'm searching)

I don't need any parts, just checking in to say I'm glad she's OK. Scary thing to happen.

Nope. That Duratec will be very hard to find a RWD transmission for.

Wow, that's a pretty significant collision. Purple was a rare color on that car to, special order only right?

And the story goes on...

I let him borrow the Super Coupe until we get the Venture back on the road. He just called, the shifter bushings in it crapped out the rest of the way and it's stuck in 5th.

At this rate I'll be out of cars by tomorrow unless I pull the For Sale signs off the Roadmaster.

Lincoln LS had a manual that bolts to it. Jaguar trans might work from the car that shared the LS' chassis since their engine is based on the duratec.

Okay, your daughter is officially no longer known as 'Crash' because your daughter in law has taken that spot. I mean, she crashed the Sable and didn't she run something off in the marsh last year?

Soooo, we got a family sub unit containing 'Crash' and 'Deerslayer'. Seriously, glad she's OK and the kids weren't with her.

Good to know about that Lincoln LS bellhousing setup...

Wow, glad everyone is ok. Those are tough cars, my sister had a 96 Taurus that went through a few nasty smacks and she walked away without a scratch.

I'm glad she is OK, that takes a heck of a hit to do that to a gen3.

Did she learn to pit maneuver the person cutting her off next time?

glad she came out if it relativly unscathed... how were the other victems? I imagine the dump truck driver got pretty beaten up too.

From watching a LOT of crash videos on youtube.. it almost seems best NOT to try to evade being hit

mad_machine wrote: glad she came out if it relativly unscathed... how were the other victems? I imagine the dump truck driver got pretty beaten up too.

The dump truck driver wasn't injured, but I'm guessing he had to throw away the underwear he was wearing. Might need a new drivers seat too. The truck still had a part of the Sable bumper stuck in the bead of the rear tire. It was 200 yards down the road by the time he got it stopped and pulled over. Last I saw it was still there. That's probably going to be a fairly expensive repair if it took out a rear axle.

mad_machine wrote: From watching a LOT of crash videos on youtube.. it almost seems best NOT to try to evade being hit

This for sure. Pile the brakes to it and hold on. Especially at a high rate of speed. We've had about 8 inches of rain in the last month. As soft as the median was, at 65 mph as soon as the tires left the pavement she was done. The soft dirt in the bottom snatched the car into oncoming traffic.

I know people complain about beige appliances and how boring they are but they are usually the safest things on the road. Had she been in a Miata she may not have been so lucky.

Count your blessings, friend.

I still remember the time as a kid when the brakes failed on my bike and I rode out of a driveway into the street, hitting the door of a car driving by and flying over the top of it. Sometimes I think how much different my life might have been had I rode down that driveway about 0.5 seconds earlier...

Count your blessings and move on. Giving her some autocross time wouldn't hurt, but sometimes stuff happens on the street that we just can't do anything about.

In reply to Toyman01:

The whole crossing the median thing really makes me glad in my area they put up the cable barriers in the medians on the interstates.

In reply to yamaha:

They are adding them around here, but only on the interstates so far. This was on US Hwy. 52, in one of the areas where the median is only about 20' wide. Not much room to gather one back up before you enter oncoming traffic.

My sister slid through a 4 way on ice and T boned someone lightly, two days later someone tagged the rear end on her car, but the last straw was the dumb E36 M3 entitled female shiny happy person that decided to pass a line of traffic in a turn lane in a fox body GT, missed the turn, and T boned the drivers side. No insurance, suspended license, stolen plate, with 2 adults and 4 toddlers in the car with no seat belts worn in the car. All that happened in a weeks time frame. Luckily my dad took my advice and pulled the air bag fuse. My 4-11 sister would have been drilled by it on that first one. Like I said tough cars, it still started and drove after the last accident.

yamaha wrote: In reply to Toyman01: The whole crossing the median thing really makes me glad in my area they put up the cable barriers in the medians on the interstates.

As a motorcyclist, I think I'd rather not have the slicers in the median.

Glad everybody's ok Toyman.

In reply to oldtin:

Oh!! I didn't think about bikers and cables. That just makes my skin crawl.

In reply to Spinout007:

No running on this one. The master fuse panel and the relay box used to be in that front corner of the car. We couldn't even get the windows to roll up. All he parts of them that aren't still under the hood, are sitting in the drivers side floorboard, as many small shards of plastic.

That was my first thought, the first time I saw em! "Damn, loose it on a bike or dropped/speedster miata and you're berkeleyed!"

yamaha wrote: In reply to Toyman01: The whole crossing the median thing really makes me glad in my area they put up the cable barriers in the medians on the interstates.

Seen enough of um snap. Barriers are great unless you hit a big puddle of water sliding you into the wall.

oldtin wrote: As a motorcyclist, I think I'd rather not have the slicers in the median.

I don't think I've ever seen the cable barriers in the median here in California. K-walls and armco seem to pretty much cover it.

back in '95, i saw the result of a K car piling into the left rear tire at what had to be a pretty decent rate of speed- the whole front clip of the car up to the firewall was wedged in between the tire and the bottom of the dump box... i must have rolled by shortly after it happened, because the first cop that was responding to the call passed me about a mile before i passed it.. anyways, everyone must have been alright since the cop was just standing there about 10 feet away with a pretty serious "wtf happened here?" look on his face- but the woman that i assume was driving the K car was a sobbing mess that was being comforted by the guy that looked like he was the driver of the dump truck, and there was a trail of debris and fluids behind the truck about a half mile long... he probably never even felt the car hit him and only stopped when he got to a red light..

Toyman01 wrote: In reply to oldtin: Oh!! I didn't think about bikers and cables. That just makes my skin crawl.

Yeah, those median cables and poorly done pavement grooving make me think that motorcyclists are way down the list of things the highway department is concerned with.