New truck and first wreck :-/

Had my first collision today. Now I'm still pretty young but I've made it 8 years driving on the road without a single incident until today. Plenty of close calls in my last two Tundras, but nothing hit thankfully.

Today that all changed. Nobody was hurt (as far as I know) and it was at least fairly low speed thanks to the pretty good brakes on the Tacoma, though ABS/emergency braking took a bit to engage at full braking pressure.

I was not at fault and I've got the video evidence to prove it since I had my dash cam installed. I picked one up off

Black Box G1W Original Dashboard Dash Cam - Full HD 1080P H.264 2.7" LCD Car DVR Camera Video Recorder with G-Sensor Night Vision Motion Detection WDR 140° Wide Angle 4X Zoom - NT96650 + AR0330

Amazon (G1W) in Jan of last year for my Tundra and moved it to the Taco when I bought it.

She only has 5,800 miles and I just bought it Dec 14th (had 4,000 on it new on the lot)
Awaiting results on how bad it is, but it's covered via their insurance. After ripping some of the plastic off I was able to drive it to a collision center I've worked with in the past (hail damage). So at least it was still drivable.

Without further ado:









As you can see here, I didn't have that many options on where to go. And while you can think of things after the fact, there's just too much going on here and you can't change the past. The red Chrysler really didn't have much business turning when they did as they cut it very close but the white Altima should not have tried to cross 6 lanes of traffic either. As you can see there is a stoplight for that very purpose right up the road... And those parking lots to the right are connected so you can easily get to the light without doing what she did.



Cropped the video quite a bit to save on upload time and irrelevant parts before it. I hate waiting minutes of time to get to the meat myself. Brakes were applied from the start of the video but ABS kicks in a bit later as you can hear.



So yeah, not the first wreck thread, but the most I've seen recently is mostly just some bumper work. Anyone else?

Also, jumping out the window in a truck isn't that easy, haha. The driver door wouldn't open at all due to the damage. And getting in the passenger side over the console isn't much fun either. But I'm young and agile.

 

Wow that sucks. Im sorry. Hopefully you'll get everything fixed to spec.

 

Good thing that you are ok.

Just looks like some fender/headlight/bumper work...maybe the crashbar and hood

Maybe some front armor in the near future?

 

Seems like you could have avoided that. Good thing you aren't a motorcyclist.

 

Sorry to hear... any damage pics of the Altima?

 

red car threw up the screen smh

 

Wow ... glad you are okay ....

 

Wow, major bummer! Glad you're O.K. There are a LOT of people driving around that seem to be educated FAR beyond their intelligence levels!
I have seen several instances of similar problems where someone won't drive a couple of hundred yards to be able to come out of a shopping center lot or whatever at an exit with a light, and will try to make the left across several lanes of traffic, just like the Altima tried to do.

 

Seems like the video was cropped to avoid judgement on your ability to avoid the accident.

Hopefully neither of you suffered any long term injuries. And its still her fault so it won't affect premiums.

Sucks that the taco is hurt, but its just metal and plastic.

 

I'm hopeful that I do, the guys at the shop I went to do good work.

Really considering it, lol. I had *some* on my Tundra, though some might say it was more of a damage multiplier as it was just a Ranch Hand Legend Grill Guard. But it had a nice solid bar down low and might have helped. Nothing like a bumper replacement though.

I think I could have, but I wasn't expecting the white car to continue on and I was already slowing, just not enough. I was only going about 38 since there was another light just behind me that I came from. If I got to replay the scenario I could probably find a way out, but no sense in doing that now is there Maybe in Dirt 3.

Not really since it was across the road from where I originally stopped. Took off their bumper cover and it was in the road. This is all I could get from my phone.

This!!! The mall in town is just like that, plus is right next to the largest highway in town so that doesn't help matters. Quite a few wrecks up there.

That wasn't my intention, but I can what you mean. The Altima was kind of chilling there for a bit and I thought in my mind at the moment they'd stay there since the Chrysler was in the way, but they went for it anyway.

I don't think there were any injuries, but never say that till a few days later due to the adrenaline rush afterwards. She was apparently quite shaken up according to the officer. I didn't see her directly because her brother did all the talking and they parked a ways down.

Yeah, the first scratch is the hardest right? Got over that one fast.

 

Glad you're alright. I hate stupid drivers and every car should have a front dash cam. It also made this thread all the more exciting to live the action.

 

Guys. Seriously. Cars aren't supposed to pull out in front of other cars from a parking lot Pretty straight forward.

 

That sucks... Were you playing a Gameboy or Atari? It sounded like video game music.

 

4000 miles off the lot?!? That was my takeaway,and yes i did read the linked post. Crazy.

 

Stupid people... It's why we can't have anything nice around here.

 

Yikes best of luck. Good thing you had the cam and the other vehicle stopped for insurance exchange.

 

Agreed. The one in the new Corvette is pretty sweet, especially since it logs speed and engine RPM and all. The officer had a camera on his glasses too. He showed us the live stream of it on his phone. Pretty slick, and I'm glad they are able to have those now too for their own defense.

Ah yes, that was Zedd - Addicted to a Memory at the very end (about 4:40). Solid album.

Yeah, that was kind of dumb but it saved me from going out of state to grab either of the two SR5's I had my eye on. Pretty happy with the Sport, though the SR5 would be perfectly fine too. My Tundra was a base model with the Rock Warrior package on it, I don't really care about bells and whistles that much The sticker price on the two are nearly identical as well. Funny how that works.

And dang you guys are fast! I'm used to much less trafficked forums, or subforms. Mostly Macrumors and XDA. New to the auto forums for the most part.

 

Sorry about the wreck OP. Good thing you have the dash cam to prove what happened. I'm sure the body shop will get her good as new

 

Also, thanks for the kind words guys. This is one of those forums where you will either get supported when your truck gets hurt or have people rip you apart over the multiple ways it could have been avoided, which isn't really constructive at all. So I'm glad it's the latter over here.



Though sometimes there's a time and place for that...

 

Just because OP theoretically could have avoided it doesn't mean jack shit. He did try to avoid it. He turned right as soon as the red car putting up the screen turned out of the way. His other option was the turn left onto oncoming traffic and risk a human carcass flying through his windshield.
OP did not do anything wrong and if anything deserves credit for having the foresight to be filming his driving. Glad you are okay, OP. Hope insurance takes good care of you.