My 2018 Model 3 saved my life and my family's too

[Lance2367]

Wow, that's incredible! I'm delighted you and yours got through this intact. I hope that driver was arrested.

The driver was not arrested. His car apparently deflected off ours and went about 100 yards further up the 405. From the looks of it, he and his wife didn't suffer any injuries.

 

[Lance2367]

Wow!! I’m so glad you and you family survived a serious crash. That’s just proof how well engineered these cars are.

I’m sure this has been posted, but this guy does a great job of explaining why the car is so well made.

How Tesla Model 3's Special Glass Makes It One Of Today's Safest Cars

Thank you, and yes, like I said, Elon's got a customer for life. I'd even do free commercials for him if they did commercials.

 

[Lance2367]

Wow! Glad you and the family are ok OP. Did they catch the bastard?

Thank you. We still haven't seen the police report yet so we don't know what his story is. He didn't drive away from the accident.

 

[Arctic_White]

No. The glass was flying from the driver's side window as soon as the crash occurred. The airbags scattered the glass instantly.

Would having tinted windows help with the scattering of the glass, I wonder?

 

[Lance2367]

Would having tinted windows help with the scattering of the glass, I wonder?

I had tinted windows. They still shattered. But the tint probably kept it from being worse.

 

[Andy7]

Thank goodness you were OK with that terrible accident. It must have been extraordinarily frightening, as you indicated. I'm glad you all had belts on, since I read about accidents all the time where the passengers are not wearing belts and are "ejected" and they usually die right there. The safety ratings are based on wearing belts, I believe. I hope you got all that glass out of your hair and that your psyches are mending.

 

[KenC]

Elon's got a customer for life in me. Two weeks ago, I was involved in a horrific crash on the 405 in Long Beach. My wife, daughter, and I were visiting SoCal on some college visits. On a Sunday morning, I was driving in lane 5 of 6 moving with traffic at about 70 mph. Out of nowhere and without warning, an SUV struck the drivers almost at a 90 degree angle at about 65-70 mph. Apparently, the SUV was in the carpool lane and cut across five lanes of traffic. I didn't see it until it hit me. The collision was so violent, all I could do was grab the steering wheel and pray. He pushed us across the 6th lane, we struck the curb, the airbags all deployed, we went off the 15-foot embankment, and rolled over, struck and cut a tree in half, which whipped our car 180 degrees from the direction we were traveling and landed upright.

Somehow, we survived all of that and my daughter was able to get the rear passenger door open (we couldn't open the front doors) and we got out of the car, bloodied, bruised, and in lots of pain, but we were alive. There's no way we should have survived the crash, and even more, the car should have been a collapsed piece of junk. But not only did we survive, the car's safety features performed perfectly and the car, as you can see in the photos, basically stayed in tact. The driver's side front door should have crushed me instantly, but it didn't get close enough to me.

Anyway, I wanted to share this to let you know that if you're driving one of these cars, it is extremely well engineered and built. We literally owe our lives to the safety of that car. I have attached pictures of the crash scene and other pics of the car from the impound lot in a PDF file attached to this post. I would do anything Tesla asked me to do to help sell more of his cars.


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So glad you and your family survived that horrific crash. I didn't realize that there were a lot more pics in the PDF that you attached. I'm so thankful you were in a safe vehicle.

 

[Mick Docherty]

So glad to hear all survived. Were you recording everything using Sentry? One bad driver can cause absolute mayhem!

 

[Lance2367]

So glad to hear all survived. Were you recording everything using Sentry? One bad driver can cause absolute mayhem!

Thank you. No, I did not have my Sentry/Dashcam set up. I do now on my new Model 3 though.

 

[Lance2367]

Thank goodness you were OK with that terrible accident. It must have been extraordinarily frightening, as you indicated. I'm glad you all had belts on, since I read about accidents all the time where the passengers are not wearing belts and are "ejected" and they usually die right there. The safety ratings are based on wearing belts, I believe. I hope you got all that glass out of your hair and that your psyches are mending.

Thank you. It was frightening indeed. I'm feeling a bit better but my wife and daughter are still having the PTSD from it. It will take time. I think the glass is now finally all gone.