Model S saved my life

[whttiger25]

Electrek lifts post quotes frequently, as well as obtains general material and topics for their website from TMC. When I saw them do it to a gal last year, who'd represented a confidential email, only to become splattered across the web, I stopped visiting their site. Shame on her for being so naive and shame on them for valuing click bait over humanity.

@whttiger25 despite the lousy situation you find yourself in, you've not whined nor once blamed anyone but yourself and I commend you for that. You referenced your parents earlier, and they must be very damn proud of you. And the deer, he thinks your pretty cool too.

Thanks, and yes, I gave permission.

 

[winfield100]

slitely off topic, but somewhat appropos.note, from the not so distant future about "Safe at any Speed" by Larry Niven

As cars and all vehicles become safer and safer, {and because of the remote area the Tesla wrecked in}, rescues may take a while, so the 3D food and oxygen and sanitary printers need to be "topped off" for a potentially long wait.

(We had a lady very near where i lived, in the mid 1970's, in Salem, Virginia, USA, Two lane, road with sharp curves, speeding, who wrecked her car, ran off the road into a dense thicket that hid the wreck, 3/4 of a mile from where I and many people lived. She broke both arms, a leg, a hip, trapped in the vehicle, and was perhaps 50 feet off a well traveled road, hidden by anyone going past, on a dangerous curve, in a very dense thicket, for 2.5 days, which I and a few hundreds drove by daily, and a walker found her, alive, i'm sure others have similar stories)

[visualize the future you want, and work towards it.]

(as a further aside, read, Iain M. Banks "Culture Series" that Elon Musk did, for a glimpse into a vision of the future he saw, well written SF)
{Link to story "Safe at any Speed"}
Larry Niven - Safe at Any Speed

 

[Atlantan]

@whttiger25 Read the article yesterday...wow, glad you are safe. Yes dealing with insurance, press, forums, family friends etc can be a headache. Look at it this way you have your second chance, your life ahead of you, a car is just that, a car and it will be replaced.

Cheers.

 

[spottyq]

if you haven't gotten to the salvage car yet : In order to get power to the 12V system (it runs basically everything except drive motors, AC compressor and HVAC) check your car's manual. There is a way to open the frunk without power (not sure it'll work in your case, seeing the extensive damage…) where you can have access to two leads. Just hook it up to some other car's 12V battery.

 

[whttiger25]

Got into the car at salvage yard using a battery jumper. Bluetooth even connected to my cell phone and started playing music. Was able to retrieve some personal items. Roof, minus sunroof glass panel, seems totally in tact.

 

[winfield100]

Got into the car at salvage yard using a battery jumper. Bluetooth even connected to my cell phone and started playing music. Was able to retrieve some personal items. Roof, minus sunroof glass panel, seems totally in tact.

i continue to be impressed by how safe Tesla's are. am glad you folks had minimal physical damage to your bodies.
good luck

 

[SMAlset]

Thanks for that roof picture whttiger25. Feeling awfully good about our MS. And boy seeing the car in the light of day must have had you feeling so thankful. Appreciate your sharing all the photos and the account of your accident with all of us.

 

[RayW]

Got into the car at salvage yard using a battery jumper. Bluetooth even connected to my cell phone and started playing music. Was able to retrieve some personal items. Roof, minus sunroof glass panel, seems totally in tact.

I've been waiting 4-week for a new front bumper, but I don't think yours will work...

 

[Max*]

I'd look at it a different way, using statistics. How many Tesla Model S passenger miles are there, compared to how many occurrences of the rear occupant area being incurred to such a degree that occupants were (or could have) been injured? I know of one so far. We've seen on TMC some pretty horrific rear-enders where the RFS area was fine (where the bumper did its job). What you're afraid of is a catastrophic roll accident where the bumper doesn't help (or doesn't help enough) AND the car rolls on the rear hatch. I think those types of accidents are extremely rare.. rare enough not to regret getting and using the RFS.

Sure, my concern isn't so much with the bumper, as it'll be rock solid. But this is the 2nd evidence of an occurrence that happened when something pushed the liftgate into the RFS occupant personal space (the first was the drunk driver driving fast and rear-ending the parked model s). Which implies if a tall car (and how many people now drive SUVs, jeeps, and pickups) not paying attention rams into the back of a Model S, the RFS occupants are at risk of being injured.

It just shows that even though these seats were advertised as "the safest spot in the car" (or something along those lines), is probably not true.


I don't use them much because my kids don't really like them, they lack ventilation, my kids get car sick, etc. but incidents like these (sure there's not a lot of them) just adds to my issues/concerns/regrets with the RFS.

 

[bmah]

Got into the car at salvage yard using a battery jumper. Bluetooth even connected to my cell phone and started playing music. Was able to retrieve some personal items. Roof, minus sunroof glass panel, seems totally in tact.

That's just amazing.

t just shows that even though these seats were advertised as "the safest spot in the car" (or something along those lines), is probably not true.

They were (so advertised)? I don't ever recall hearing or reading that (but never considered getting the RFS either, so maybe I just wasn't paying attention).

Bruce.

 

[ChadS]

I wouldn't say they were "advertised" that way, but Musk did make a comment along those lines once.

All two incidents show is that the RFS are not PERFECTLY safe, which was never the claim. It does not give us any data about how safe they are in relation to other seats in the car. There are a lot more than two incidents of intrusions in to other parts of the car, no? HLR's statistics approach is harder to do because it's hard to get all the numbers, but is the only way you can learn something of value about relative safety of the various seating positions.

When my kids were small I looked at a lot of accident statistics (not for Teslas as it was long ago, but in general). The very back of the car is indeed relatively safe; the main reason being that the speed differential in most accidents involving that area is generally smaller. Not always smaller of course, so there will be accidents where people in those seats get killed. Just fewer than people sitting in most other seats. (Yes, even after adjusting for frequency of seat occupation).

The middle of the second row is also a good spot; far better than the outboard positions of the second row.

 

[whttiger25]

I wouldn't say they were "advertised" that way, but Musk did make a comment along those lines once.

All two incidents show is that the RFS are not PERFECTLY safe, which was never the claim. It does not give us any data about how safe they are in relation to other seats in the car. There are a lot more than two incidents of intrusions in to other parts of the car, no? HLR's statistics approach is harder to do because it's hard to get all the numbers, but is the only way you can learn something of value about relative safety of the various seating positions.

When my kids were small I looked at a lot of accident statistics (not for Teslas as it was long ago, but in general). The very back of the car is indeed relatively safe; the main reason being that the speed differential in most accidents involving that area is generally smaller. Not always smaller of course, so there will be accidents where people in those seats get killed. Just fewer than people sitting in most other seats. (Yes, even after adjusting for frequency of seat occupation).

The middle of the second row is also a good spot; far better than the outboard positions of the second row.

It was tough to get a picture but there was about 1.5 feet of space between the back of the rear seats and the caved in rear lift gate. Not saying children would be injury free, but there was wiggle room assuming they are securely strapped down

 

[NikeWings]

That's just amazing.
They were (so advertised)? I don't ever recall hearing or reading that (but never considered getting the RFS either, so maybe I just wasn't paying attention).
Bruce.

I don't recall either but may have ignored it. Our parents never let us ride in the 3rd row of our old Ford woody wagon for the same concerns Max expresses. It was so ingrained in us growing up - no way I'd pivot back to it as an adult, despite improved tech. And these pictures are revealing. I think @Max* is on to something here.....no need to wait for a tragedy.

 

[ChadS]

That would be great if there was another spot that was perfectly safe, but there are tragedies in every seating position. A small number of pictures of bad accidents only tell us that no place in a car is perfectly safe, but we already knew that.

The likelihood of being killed in any specific position is what you should be concerned with. That takes a lot more data; it cannot be discerned from looking at a few disturbing pictures.

 

[NikeWings]

It was tough to get a picture but there was about 1.5 feet of space between the back of the rear seats and the caved in rear lift gate. Not saying children would be injury free, but there was wiggle room assuming they are securely strapped down

Agree^^^^ ChadS. We cross posted. While we can't find perfection, we can avoid the most prone when possible.

The bottom 1/3 of the glass hatch appears caved-in......at about the height of a childs head. So while their feet/knees may have escaped harm, their upper bodies are prone. Perhaps a direct hit from the rear, absorbs much of the shock, but a roll like experienced is scary stuff for the RFS. The pics, story and recovery are invaluable...thank you for sharing.

 

[Max*]

They were (so advertised)? I don't ever recall hearing or reading that (but never considered getting the RFS either, so maybe I just wasn't paying attention).

Bruce.

Advertised? No. Tweeted or commented on by EM, yes.

This is someone else quoting him on it, I can't find the original source, it's 4 years old:
How safe are rear facing seats | Tesla

"These back seats are possibly the safest seats in the Car, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said. And the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety agrees.

 

[phaduman]

Another observation:

The front and rear bumper beams and the main two beams that run the length of the car are relatively intact. - didn't crumple. I think the rest of the car's front and back (if car doesn't get hit in the relatively low beam areas) are quite soft and can get crushed quite easily. The truck accident in San Diego that killed a girl on the front-facing rear seat (that car didn't have RFS) - the truck went over the beam area and went straight into the passenger compartment (granted the speed delta was quite high - likely 70Mph for the trunk and nearly stopped Tesla).

I am not scientist in this area (and so in all probability could be wrong), I think the back section should have some vertical beams at the two corners at least (near bumpers) connected to the low beams to allow some impact absorption for taller vehicles/objects). The front section cannot have this luxury because we want the front to be as narrow as possible to be aerodynamic...

Steel columns/bars in orange (below, pathetic image - lol) is what I am imagining to help protect the occupants more if a taller vehicle hits a MS from back (or front). I understand pillars A and C are there to protect the passenger compartment further, but those are too close to the people already at that time.

 

[John5396]

I was looking at wheel sets on ebay, and found this listing.

2016 Tesla Model S 60 19" Slipstream Wheels & Tires Goodyear P245/45R19 Set NTO | eBay

These are from the IIHS rollover test car, and the listing from the junk yard has pictures of the car. Compared to the side rollover damage from the IIHS test car, the OP's car has all the damage front and rear. So looks like the OP's car was cartwheeling end over end.

Darn amazed and happy you walked away.

 

[Wallace02]

wow I am glad you are ok!!

 

[Motomania]

Glad to hear the OP is okay. That's a heckuva crash to walk away from.
-
I wouldn't even have an ounce of concern about insurance coverage; you'll be fine. Even when people wreck their cars, get DWI's and are arrested; insurance still covers damage to the vehicle.
-
Once again, great to hear you and your passenger walked away!