CamaroStylin

well guys, after the WEEKS of endless labor, thousands of dollars, and quite possibly more love than ive ever even shown my own mother, the camaro's been totalled. saturday night i was heading down lauderdale on my way home so i could have a bunch of friends over and a toyota 4 runner pulled out in front of me fast as ANYTHING without stopping at the stop sign. i didnt even have time to hit the brakes. i SLAMMED into the side of his car at the rear axle, ripping the axle right off the car and sending the wheel downt he road, which another car ran over about 10 minutes later, blowing her wheel out and bending her rim. My car took the hit directly front on. i did a 180 and slid down the road backwards for a little ways. after i realized where i was and looked around, i checked myself over quickly. my nose was split open, my right thumb was turning blue and both my knees had completely crumpled the dash from the under side. nobody from the other car came near me as i sat still in my car. there were two nurses living in the house it happened in front of and they helped me until the paramedics showed up. i wasnt that bad off, but i could see the car was totalled. the intake for the engine was sticking up in the air and i could see part of the bumper on teh left side completely mangled from where i was sitting.

paramedics got there and i got out of the car through the passenger door. my door was jammed back into the body of the car and wouldnt open. after that the medics would let me move, not even to turn my head and look at my car. they put me on a stretcher, in an ambulance and sent me to st. marys hospital where i got checked over and had an X-ray taken of my hand. everything's fine and i had a friend pick me up and chill with me at my house a while. my nose was swollen, my thumb was swollen with blood under my nail, and both my knees were swollen and bruised. While i was in the ER the officer came up to me and said they measured the skid marks and judging by statistics, i was going too fast and so they charged me with "wreckless driving-general" and sent the other kid home completely free. the kid even said to the cop "i couldnt see anyone comming-the bushes were in my way." and i still get the ticket for this.

overall im fine. im healing quickly and i expect to be back to 100% by the weekend, with the exception of my thumb nail that i will, without a doubt, lose. Ive always healed pretty fast and so far this hasnt changed for this story.

the next morning i went to get my stuff out of the car, and when i saw the car, i was..... speachless to say the least. absolutely amazed may be a better way to put it. this looks like something that no mortal could have walked away from. it looks so bad, i wouldnt even know it was my car unless i looked on the inside and saw my stuff. i've got picks from a camera i bought at foodlion. i thought maybe you guys would like to see.
here's the car when i VERY first got it in feb of 03:
http://www.angelfire.com/va/Mettalic...tLeftFeb03.JPG
that doesnt include any of the work that i did to it at all. i did quite a bit to it. it was gorgeous... loved by everyone in the area. people say your car and your art are an extention of you and your personality. I have said that many times before about this car and i never realized how right i was until i saw it yesterday morning and realized that it really was gone.
Here are a couple of pictures of what i came across sunday morning... after lookin at the car, i've realized that i was extremely lucky to be in the condition i was in.
http://www.angelfire.com/va/Mettalic...FrontLeft3.jpg
http://www.angelfire.com/va/Mettalic...FrontRight.jpg
http://www.angelfire.com/va/Mettalic...s/Interior.jpg
notice on the interior pic how the dash is shoved back into the middle console. the cd player is pulled out cause i removed it before taking the pics. i didnt have a camera at first. also notice that the dash has been complete shoved up by my knees and the under-the-column pieces are shattered. my keyless entry brain box is hanging down from breakin loose, and notice the distance between the steering column and the dash cluster's bottom edge. also take a look at the split going from the front of the dash in front of my seat-it was broken in half from everything moving up so hard.
http://www.angelfire.com/va/Mettalic...DriverDoor.jpg
this would explain why my door wouldnt open.
http://www.angelfire.com/va/Mettalic.../TtopsRear.jpg
and there's evidence of the whole car being twisted-the driver t-top was popped out of place and the little lip in the middle where the glass goes is bent upward.
http://www.angelfire.com/va/Mettalic...ToyotaFull.jpg
and here's the 4 runner i hit. i think he won...

i'm going to have to get a good lawyer on this one. if i dont get this thrown out, i'm gonna lose my lisence, my insurance coverage (which it tooks 3 weeks just to find someone to cover us after the last company), and my job that i've been training for during the last 4 months at work. I quit going to college for this job and if i lose it.... i dont even know whats gonna happen.

I dont mean to sound like a complete downer, but this really sucks... im lookin at third gens in the trading post. ive been calling all day to everyone who has one listed that id be interested in, and so far nothing has struck my fancy except one 89 firebird trans am formula with the L98 motor, WS6 suspension, rear disc brakes, black interior and exterior and t-tops. the guy wants 1500 cause the tranny is slipping. i may take it just until i can sell it and buy a camaro instead. i want to build it in the same image as the one i had until this past weekend. i loved it.

PyRo9862

That sucks. Atleast your ok though.
Didn't you say you didn't even hit the brakes? Then they measured your skidmarks? How did they do that? They are basing it on statistics, they have no way of knowing exactly how fast your car can slow down, sounds like a lawyer should get it thrown right out. Are they saying its your fault, and ignoring the fact the kid ran the stop sign?
And just how fast were you going, you fail to mention that.

MasterEvilAce

Dude, that completely sucks.
Were you speeding? If you weren't, and that guy did run the stopsign, I'd say you really, really need to fight this.. your car is totalled, and that guy got off pretty much scott-free, I guess...

I hope it works out for you

DarthIROC

Yeah if you werent speeding, I would definetely fight it.

92RS305#2

i could understand if you hit the 4runners rear end but to hit it on the side the stupid driver of the 4runner obviosly didn't look to see if anyone was coming. the police will always blame the camaro owner if an accident happens cuz all camaro owners drive fast . glad to hear your okay, life moves on only if you live so remember that.

Rice Killer87

dam that really blows man,im sorry.

im guessing they measured the marks your car made while it was sliding? b/c u said u didnt hit the brakes.

not sure if its just me or not,but i couldnt see any of the pictures...i wish i could.

hope everything works out tho man

IROC-T

I couldn't pull-up any of the pics,but "may she rest in peace".

Black6SpdTA

You don't want to. From what he sent me on AIM..... It looks horrible!

CamaroStylin:
You told me you hit the brakes? Like I told you though, I'd have a pro look at it. They can't just assume like that. I know in NC, even if someone pulls out in front of you, if you're speeding by like 2mph, no one is at pure fault. They split it 50/50 in that case. Good luck though and keep me updated on the search for a replacement. Take care.

-Corey

CamaroStylin

you couldnt pull up any pics? they all worked on mine. i mean they're horrific.... but they worked.

i was going 40 in a 35. i had my foot resting on the floor board when he pulled out, by the time i hit him, i only had time to put my foot over the brake. i didnt actually touch it yet. my body weight pushed it in at impact. we just got back from the crash site and my stepdad was there for some time and took a really really good look at it. he made several VERY valid points that i think would get me off the hook unless the judge is a damn idiot. here they are.

1. the road where the kid pulled out had recently been patched right at the stop sign and hadnt actually been finished. the slick material was ALL OVER the intersection from cars pulling in and out. that made the entire area slick. i need to check the weather report, but if it was humid that day, that would make it even worse. that's very important.

2. at the point of impact there is a deep gash of silver about 8 inches wide (guess what that was) right where my front left rim would have been at impact. what do you know, my front left tire was blown out and my rim has an extreme bend in the outside edge. that indicates that the car was forced under the 4 runner (which would explain why my hood is crumpled up so far. his broken axle drove my hood all the way to the windshield) and the tire struck the ground as the rear end lifted off the ground. the car then spun slightly in the air and the front left tire didnt touch the ground again until about 15 feet down the road. you can see the exact point when it reconnected with the road. from there, you can see that the car was actually only sliding on two tires. the other two have skid marks that are so thin it shows that they were hardly touching the ground. in fact at some points the marks arnt even an inch and a half thick. that, would be cause both by the slick road and also by th efact that it was downhill. now, that fact is more supported by the fact that the two tires that were actually dragging in the rear have marks that go from light to dark, light, dark, light, dark and so on until the car finally stopped, thus meaning the front end really was bouncing. now, that explains the long skid marks.

where the other driver is at fault is even more interesting. from the stop sign, if you stopped where you were supposed to, the bushes really are in your way, which is exactly what the kid said. "the bushes were in my way and i couldnt see him." so, that tells me he really pulled out without knowing if anyone was comming or not. now, to even further support our story, we measured it in time, from when a car comes over the hill into view from that intersection to when it actually reaches the point of contact. it averages 10 or 11 seconds. its assumed those cars were traveling between 40 and 45 mph. if he had looked down the road and actually checked for a car, EVEN IF i was travelling at twice the speed limit, which is what his passengers claimed, then he would have had 5 and a half seconds from the time i became visible to the time i reached him to impact in order to move. so plain and simple. the bushes were in his way. he just pulled out without inching forward to look down the road.

if i dont get out of this, im gonna be pissed. i mean im already in a deep depression about my car. ill never get another one like it, but i can try.

what do you guys think about that firebird?

CamaroStylin

ok guys, i see what happened here. angelfire decided to be gay and block all pics that are not sourced from one of their pages. ill make a page for it ASAP

IROC-T

Hopefully you took lots of pics of the crash scene today so that when you go to court you have photo back-up to your story. Lots of photos always helps when going to court,believe me. This is almost the same thing that happened to my son about six months ago,only it was a drunk driver that ran a red light. She almost skated because he was doing 35 in a 30mph zone.

Pneumatic_Tire

AngleFire is so gay. I can't stand them.

firebirdjosh

That hurts to look at. The most important thing is you are ok.

PyRo9862

www.imageshack.us

CamaroStylin

ok guys, angelfire wouldnt allow me to post my pics on the camaroz28 because the files are uploaded on their site, so i made a webpage on their server under my same source page and put links to all the pics on there along with some comments. it seems to work fine-i've checked each of the links.
let me know what you guys think of the pics. i was speachless when i saw it in person.
http://www.angelfire.com/va/MettalicaFan/Index3.html