ouch, roadster accident, video evidence

[Carl W]

My wife was driving our 2008 1.5 today in Laguna Beach when an SUV pulled out in front of her. She hit the brakes, but you'll see the impact. An office across the street got it on their security video and attached here are pictures from that video. Hoping this is enough that our insurance company 100% blames the SUV driver. The car still drives. Is this fix going to be so expensive that she'll be totalled?

I can post the actual video on youtube or whatever if you guys want to see it.

 

[Carl W]

I uploaded the video. Here it is.

 

[Puddles]

Aw! Condolences

 

[Timothy]

Ouch! But in the BIG picture, how is your wife? If she is OK, what happened to the car is WAY less important. Best wishes first to your wife--and a distant second to the car!

 

[AEdennis]

My wife was driving our 2008 1.5 today in Laguna Beach when an SUV pulled out in front of her. She hit the brakes, but you'll see the impact. An office across the street got it on their security video and attached here are pictures from that video. Hoping this is enough that our insurance company 100% blames the SUV driver. The car still drives. Is this fix going to be so expensive that she'll be totalled?

I can post the actual video on youtube or whatever if you guys want to see it.

Sorry that happened @Carl W

Is your wife OK?

Shop around and see, looks like the guys in Washington have molds for the body panels...

 

[Carl W]

Forgot to say my wife is fine. It was the first thing I asked when she called after the accident. After finding out she was fine, I headed to the accident site but I still didn't know if it was in the Roadster or our minivan. Admittedly, on the way, I was saying to myself "be the van, be the van..."

 

[Roadster]

Aw man, Carl that's painful to watch Glad to hear Mary Jo's okay.

Definitely seems like the MBZ driver didn't see her approaching from behind the parked Infiniti QX60. Insurance should hopefully rule in your favor as your wife had right of way.

Paging @ExecMotorwerkz and Javier to get his assessment on the damage. Might require a house call.

 

[ExecMotorwerkz]

Man this sucks hopefully the front crash assembly isn't that messed up. But I think I have one on my storage if needed. Will need to see how bad the hood is.

 

[hanknum]

Bummer man...in my best Dude voice.

Glad your wife is OK.

A few things to point out in the video:

- The MB SUV never came to a complete stop
- The SUV should have stopped and allowed the pedestrian to cross in front.
- The SUV actually turned too sharp and actually started to travel in the wrong direction initially.

Hate to say it...but most people don't know how to drive correctly. They need to make the driving test more difficult...stepping down from the soap box now.

 

[im4uttx]

For "at fault" question to the insurance...
1) since the accident was in the lane your wife was traveling, that is going to point to the SUV driver fault.
2) video shows the SUV turning into the lane your wife was in, so that should again point to SUV driver fault.
3) speed could be brought into question, but visibility of the SUV from the roadster was probably impaired by the parked vehicle. Hopefully your wife did not give any statement that she was even remotely near the speed limit, but less above it.
4) from the video, your wife seemed to appear almost the same time as the SUV pulled out, so there was less than maybe 30-40 feet of travel by the time she would have seen the SUV, and not nearly enough time to stop, even at a low speed.

Glad she is alright, and sad the roadster will require some work.

Parts are expensive, but it should not total the roadster. Mine is in the shop for new rear bumper and trunk, with the total at $!6,500 currently...luckily it wasn't my fault, but I'm still having withdrawals from not driving it for the last 3 weeks.

Seems like this type accident is common...I've had 2 close calls that scared me pretty bad:
1) nearing an intersection, 3 lanes each direction, with 3 lanes each direction on cross traffic, and left turn lanes, truck started turning left in front of me, stopped half way in my lane, but I was able to swerve to my right to avoid.
2) same road, but a little further down, car entered the road from business driveway on right, I was in left lane, but car came across both lanes almost clipping me as I swerved slightly left (far left edge of the left most lane) just barely getting by, saw in the rear view mirror the car cleanly comes into the left lane behind me...

The roadster sits low, and my thunder gray may blend into pavement color, but I drive with my headlights on. I'm still learning about more and more defensive driving with it, but couldn't avoid the driver hitting me from behind while I was stopped exiting a restaurant parking lot...

2 more weeks until I get mine back...

 

[Watts_Up]

Bummer man...in my best Dude voice.
Glad your wife is OK.
A few things to point out in the video:
- The MB SUV never came to a complete stop
- The SUV should have stopped and allowed the pedestrian to cross in front.
- The SUV actually turned too sharp and actually started to travel in the wrong direction initially.
Hate to say it...but most people don't know how to drive correctly.
They need to make the driving test more difficult...stepping down from the soap box now.

Obviously the SUV driver should have stoped first to check if there was no pedestrian, left and right.

Then the driver should have moved to the edge of the car parked in the street and stopped, to check if there was no car on the right and the left.

I recently witnesses a similar accident with a car leaving a gas station the same way the SUV did.
I was pedestrian on the other side of the street, and it was very scary as the car hit another car coming from the right
and bounced into another one on the left.
The noise was incredible, and few second earlier I would certainly have been hit by one of the cars.
Everything goes so fast that, as pedestrian, there is no time to move away.

The exit of my parking garage is very similar to the accident location.
It's a one way street, so I can only turn right when going from the garage into the street.
However, it's always tricky to merge into the traffic.

I wonder if I should install some cameras at the front of the car, to see the coming traffic on the right side?
To be able to see the coming traffic, I need to have my head aligned with the front right side of the car parked on the left side of the street.
But to do so, I need to have my car hood in the street lane, which can create an accident, with cars or bicycles trying to avoid me.
There are more and more electric bicycles and it is very difficult to see those bicycles coming quite fast.

I have the FSD option, and I am puzzle how my car would be able to exit from my driveway by itself.
I quite often need to look through the windsield of the car parked in the street to see to coming traffic.

Without any additional camera at the front of the car, I wonder how a FSD car would be able to see cars coming,
or to learn, as the only safe way to do it, to look through the windshild of a car parked on the side of the street?

 

[X.l.r.8]

That’s no fun watching, thankfully it was nothing more serious. Glad to hear no one was hurt and you don’t have to argue over the facts as it’s all there on camera.

 

[Carl W]

Man this sucks hopefully the front crash assembly isn't that messed up. But I think I have one on my storage if needed. Will need to see how bad the hood is.

Thanks to all for your concern and suggestions. Will start by seeing what our insurance company wants to do and go from there. Thanks and noted Javier. Glad also to have the extra analysis of the accident. For example, we hadn't noticed the pedestrians that the SUV should have stopped for. Note that my wife never said anything to anyone about speed and she really was within the speed limit there. FYI, she called the police, but they said their policy is to not get involved in any crash unless there are injuries. A cop came by anyway, but the other driver had already left and he mostly just explained that the police don't get involved and that drivers should just exchange information and let the insurance investigators figure it out. This was news to us and not sure if this is just a local city thing, or a state thing, or what.

 

[PV-EV]

Unfortunate, but your wife clearly had the right of way. If the frame didn’t get tweaked you will be ok. Just be prepared that this might take a while to resolve/repair.

 

[hanknum]

Also, currently there are some body panels listed on Ebay right now...fyi.

 

[jfischer]

My wife was driving our 2008 1.5 today in Laguna Beach when an SUV pulled out in front of her. She hit the brakes, but you'll see the impact. An office across the street got it on their security video and attached here are pictures from that video. Hoping this is enough that our insurance company 100% blames the SUV driver. The car still drives. Is this fix going to be so expensive that she'll be totalled?

I can post the actual video on youtube or whatever if you guys want to see it.

Sorry Carl,

I feel your pain in the same way. Mine got hit in the same place by a driver going the WRONG way, totally the other drivers fault.
AUGH!

Biggest issue is parts availability from Tesla. Currently these are not available and you will need them as I had almost the same crash.

They couldn't handle the body work at Houston North SC Body Shop so I'll prob send it out to Carl and Son in Seattle to do the work...

Good Luck with your repair....

 

[Carl W]

Sorry Carl,

I feel your pain in the same way. Mine got hit in the same place by a driver going the WRONG way, totally the other drivers fault.
AUGH!




View attachment 473546
View attachment 473547



Biggest issue is parts availability from Tesla. Currently these are not available and you will need them as I had almost the same crash.

They couldn't handle the body work at Houston North SC Body Shop so I'll prob send it out to Carl and Son in Seattle to do the work...

View attachment 473543

Good Luck with your repair....

Aww, that's a shame you got hit that way. Noted about the unavailable parts and you're right that we'll need many of the same parts. Questions, if you don't mind: were they able to quote the repair even if they couldn't do it? If so, roughly how expensive? Is the other insurance company going to pay to have your car sent out to Seattle for the work? Did they offer to total it and just pay you? If so, what did they offer? Love my specific #311 car, but it would be much simpler and faster to get paid out and buy another. Feel free to message me if you'd rather not share some of the info on the forum.

 

[slcasner]

Mine got hit in the same place by a driver going the WRONG way, totally the other drivers fault.
AUGH!

Did this just happen (that is, subsequent to all the GPS firmware discussion)?

 

[jfischer]

Happ

Did this just happen (that is, subsequent to all the GPS firmware discussion)?

Happened two weeks ago after the GPS work and the GPS thread discussion. Guess I should have just left it...

Had a Roadster meet up on Sat in Austin with 8 other ones, and got into the accident 3 days later... Sigh....

 

[DeedWest]

Carl,

So bummed to hear about 311, but I’m thankful your wife is okay. I feel like Thunder Gray is so close to the pavement’s color that nobody notices it. The amount of times I nearly got hit in 1414 was alarming (no one can seem to drive correctly in Dallas).

I’ve seen similar repairs be somewhere around $13,000+.