gut wrenching

 

worse than that. the driver was a habitual offender of speed laws and did it with such reckless abandon that he got caught 10 times before plowing into this family.

 

How is it that "a BMW hit a Volt" rather than "a BMW hit a Chevy".
How is it that an AP-equipped Tesla is a first "self-driving car fatality". Rather than "a Tesla ran into a truck".

It's called click bait and it's disgusting given the fatalities.

 

Well, my local paper always lists the make and model of vehicle in an accident article when known. The first auto drive fatal accident is news because it is the first auto drive fatal accident.

 

That would be news if it were true. Tesla's TACC isn't special other than calling it 'AutoPilot'. People get killed using cruise control improperly every day.

Just as this jerk killed three people using a high power car improperly on public roads.

35,000 senseless deaths in the US every year mostly due to the drivers. Calling out the few where high-tech cars are involved is click bait, exploitation and insensitive.

 

I spent 15 years as a traffic homicide investigator. All I'll say is that it's astounding that anyone survived a side impact from a car going over 100mph.

 

This is very, very sad—it hits especially close to home given that it affected a whole family of fellow Volt owners. It's a good reminder to all drivers to think carefully about how their actions can directly and permanently affect the lives of not just themselves, but the others around them. Stay safe, everyone.

 

What a Fu??ing idiot, I hope he gets the full 30 years.

 

And gets his right foot amputated!

 

Wow, this is disgusting....while I feel for the BMW driver because he obviously had no intention to cause this, the ridiculous speed he was driving at shows a complete lack of understanding regarding safety. Maximum penalty, make an example out of him. All the "I'm sorrys" in the world can't even make a dent in the horror he has been directly responsible for.....

To me this is no different than walking around with a gun and a blindfold and randomly shooting....that act is clearly deadly and stupid, and driving 115mph in a 45 zone at night with a school close by is just as negligent and stupid. At least the idiot has to live with what he has done, and hopefully it never leaves him. If he had died in the crash too he would have gotten off too easily....and he still will get off too easily IMO.

If you murder 3 people, isn't it 3 life sentences you should be facing and not "up to 30 years", but more likely 3-12 years as mentioned later in the article? I'm so angered by this I can barely keep calm while writing this. I mean, we've all sped before, but going that far over the limit should be treated no different than pointing a gun a shooting someone in the head....

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/loca...eadly-bethesda-crash/2016/07/13/b503b30a-4750-11e6-acbc-4d4870a079da_story.html

Thanks for posting this, I had read about the crash earlier with quite a lot of interest and was glad to see this article expound on the limited information that was available back then.

To the posters arguing about the wording of the headlines: (a) I think you're attributing a lot more motivation to the headline writers than they deserve, and (b) this is about reckless driving - a topic that's far more serious and discussion-worthy IMHO.

 

These things are tragic. Hopefully in the near future we'll have safety features that eliminate them or significantly reduce the severity. It's certainly possible for technology to help reduce these types of fatalities. Fixing blame after the fact is necessary but doesn't really solve anything. Better just not to eliminate the accident.

 

I have one safety feature that would have helped and the technology exists:

speed governors. why would any street car need to go +45 mph faster than any legal speed limit?

 

Leave the poor guy alone, after all he's been "profoundly distraught", according to his attorney.

 

Distraught that this spoiled brat is going to jail. He won't be speeding for a while. Three lives are worth more than a few of his years. He hasn't learned his lesson from being caught before. He felt that he is above the law. Time for him to find out the full force of the law in jail.

 

"...I flashed my lights at it."

That was the most disgusting line of the whole story. Rather than hit the brake he flashed his lights. Going 115 miles per hour.

I hope he gets the max.

 

So much for his original claim of travelling at the speed limit.

 

After driving a CTS-V around a race track, I've concluded that driving something with that much HP on public roads with potholes, pedestrians, and other cars is crazy.The temptation is just too great to do something stupid like this. IMHO ludicrous and insane modes are also horrible ideas.

 

Seriously. Insurance companies and maybe car manufacturers need to start taking a close look at their customers and saying "No. You've got two moving violations in a seven-year window. We're not selling you anything good for more than 125 HP anymore."

 

That doc that climbed into the Volt trying to help....to be surrounded by all that death and still be able to maintain their composure and help the lone survivor....that's crazy.

Throw the book at that stupid ass ****. 30 years in the slammer should teach him a lesson. Sickening he's already posturing for a lighter sentence, expressing all that "regret" for the people he killed. I hope the judge sees through the acting and gives him the maximum sentence.

btw, here's an article detailing the job of a police collision reconstruction unit, to include the Montgomery County unit that investigated the fatal Volt crash. Pretty heartbreaking stuff.

http://www.bethesdamagazine.com/Bet...ind-the-Scenes-with-the-Montgomery-County-Police-Collision-Reconstruction-Unit/

Looking at the photos again, the BMW drilled the Volt right in the right side passenger doors..at 75+ mph, as we now know. Poor people sitting passenger side never had a chance, seatbelts or not.

 

They should have thrown the book at him at the previous cases. We are sickened here in Ontario about a case where a drunk billionaire's kid killed 4 people (incl. 3 kids) in a drunk driving incident and he only got 10 years ( be out in 5 on parole). They do concurrent sentences here instead of consecutive. Makes no sense, if you kill one person might as well kill many as you serve all sentences at same time. We are all hoping victims's family will sue this guy for millions.
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/c...-for-drunk-driving-crash-that-killed-three-newmarket-kids-and-their-grandfather

 

Thank you for posting the update. I was sickened when reading this when it first happened. This guy shouldn't ever see the light of day again. Total disregard for human life.

I made my kids (getting ready to drive) read this article. It hits home when this is the car I drive and they ride in every day.

 

I still don't completely understand how the driver perished if he was wearing his seatbelt. Unless he was hit by a projectile after impact, like (not trying to be morbid) his son's body.

Do manufacturers eventually get back vehicles involved in fatal collisions for research purposes? Try and see how any safety improvements can be made, if any.

 

of all the accidents you can have, being in a car hit from the side is the deadliest. there is insufficient crash zone to absorb the impact. Side door reinforcements were not meant to absorb the kind of energy as a front or rear impact, although they have made cars a ot safer. side air bags help as well but there are limits.


Back a couple of decades ago they use to teach drive defensively. A practice I still follow. You want to drive in such a manner as to protect your flanks. Dont ever place the side of your car in harms way. The driver of the BMW should have avoided at all costs hitting that car where he did. from where that car ended up, it looks like his only tactic was to slam on the brakes. a bad driver with poor skills and judgement in a hot rod of a car.

 

To put things in perspective, I did a quick calculation of the energies involved in this....

The BMW weighs around 3,500 kg and that amount of weight travelling at 100 mph has a whopping 3.5 megajoules of kinetic energy....

to put that in a different way, thats about equivalent to 1 kg of TNT.....

a stick of dynamite has around 1 megajoule of explosive energy....

so basically this impact had similar forces to throwing 3 sticks of dynamite at the car

f*cking moron....they should put a stick of dynamite up his a$$ and light it

 

Your math is close... it was 3500lb (not kg) and he hit them at 75mph, so about 0.9 MJ. Still horrific, of course, and a very sad story. The article said the surviving daughter was doing actually still doing ok in school... I just can't imagine.

 

I said it in the original thread, and I'll say it again. That particular intersection is a death trap and has been for a long time and I can't believe that they STILL haven't improved it.

Combine that with a homicidally reckless driver and... tragedy.

Specifics about that intersection in this post...

 

I'm not sure any intersection can be made safe from someone going through it at 115 MPH. Which is how fast the BMW was travelling when it approached. The "75 MPH" figure being waved around is the speed at impact, AFTER the BMW had scrubbed off as much speed as it could.

 

Here's a side impact crash test of a Gen 1 Volt. Testing simulates impact of a 3,300 pound SUV traveling at 31 mph.

The damage inflicted by the 31 mph crash seems pretty severe, so imagine an even heavier BMW traveling 44 mph faster than the crash test sled.

 

On a side note, I'm always just astounded at how fast airbags deploy.

 

And.....damn...don't smash into the back of a semi, or you might lose your head....literally. I think we get an idea of what happened to Joshua Brown.

 

I recall a news story a month or two ago where a couple was riding a motorcycle and t-boned an SUV at 80 km/h.....the article said that the force of the impact was so severe the motorcycle caused the SUV to barrel roll....that was a motorcycle going ~ 50 mph. I'm still amazed it was able to flip the SUV.

 

BMW, the ultimate killing machine.

 

Lots to agree with opinion-wise, but one thing strikes me odd is that the black box data only showed the Volt doing 10 mph at the time the airbags deployed. I know some people are timid drivers, but I can assure you had I been caught crossing the road by surprise I would have put my foot to the floor.

Seems like everybody did everything that they could possibly do wrong. Not that the deceased should have had to make an evasive move- but the accident, as described, didn't show a sense of urgency on the victim's part.

 

Lots to agree with opinion-wise, but one thing strikes me odd is that the black box data only showed the Volt doing 10 mph at the time the airbags deployed. ... Not that the deceased should have had to make an evasive move- but the accident, as described, didn't show a sense of urgency on the victim's part.

Don't know what happened before that. He may have hit the brakes prior to impact, especially if the other car steered right. Or, based on the curve, angles, and headlights, he may have thought that the car was going to go past his front, not hit him in the side.
Or, another car may have just gone by, and he was just starting to accelerate with no idea that a car was coming at over 100mph.

Without having the witness statements, sightlines, road grade and elevation, etc, there's no way to know. Reaction time to unexpected stimulus is at least a second to observe, orient, decide, and act. At 100mph closure, that's 146 feet (or about half a football field).

I think it's likely the driver either never knew what hit him, or saw the car but had literally could not move his muscles fast enough to do anything about it. I've been in that position. It sucks when you see a threat coming, time dilation slows everything down, but there's not enough time for your muscles to actually move.