Guess the speed.

[Dave Plowman (News]

There was an accident in my road on Monday. About 50 yards on from the end (T-junction)

A Merc SUV driven by a young woman claims to have swerved to avoid a cat. All other vehicles involved parked.

It first hit the rear side of a BMW, scraped all along it and broke off the front wheel and suspension. Next hit the Golf behind it pushing the rear well onto the pavement over a high kerb. The Golf in turn hit a 911 and pushed that into the car behind.

At some point the Merc spun sideways and hit a car parked on the other side. Merc spewed out oil onto the road. No serious injury to driver or passenger in the Merc.

Police and emergency services soon at the scene. Driver apparently sober.

Claimed to be observing the speed limit which is 20 mph.

[R D S]

My son has written off two cars, he had to crawl out of one while it was upside down after a brief period of unconsciousness.

"It's a good job I wasn't speeding", they must think folk are thick.

[Colin Bignell]

It is not unknown for a driver who panics to hit the accelerator instead of the brake and those things weigh over two tonnes, so can do a lot of damage even at slow speed. If the police think she was speeding, they will probably get an accident investigator to take a look.

Any domestic CCTV, yours or neighbours', that might have caught the incident?

[Jim Stewart ...]

wummin driver...all we need to know

[soup]

A Merc, a BMW, a Porsche and a Golf (well the nanny has to drive something) all in your street , bit Pan-loafy.

Seems like they were doing a lot more than 20 MPH, but :-

I once reversed VERY slowly out of a parking spot merely kissed the car behind me and yet the assessor listed it as a write-off. During the entire incident speed was in the 0~5mph range (well it was all in reverse so 0~-5mph)

Excuse:-

I drive an automatic that moves itself out of my favourite parking spot all I have to do is feather the brake a bit. This day though I was parked two spaces along from it which was sloped in the opposite way so I had to apply a little throttle to help the car out of the space. Taking a little glance in the mirror' I see a car behind me and gently apply brake to stop just before him, but of course my foot was on the throttle not the brake so I didn't stop (in my defense it was first thing in the morning and I was half asleep).

Bit more experienced now, never nosy park if it can be helped, can't see me making that mistake again.

[alan_m]

That what you get when a tank driven at 20mph hits lesser vehicles :)

Possibly she hit the accelerator rather than the brake pedal.

[Andrew]

Nearer to 3 tonnes I suspect. Neighbour has a hyundai iconic plug-in hybrid courtesy car from Enterprise and that is 1,970 Kg.

[Andrew]

Probably doing her makeup while driving at 40+ in a 30 zone.

[Jim Stewart ...]

and throws her hands up to her face and laughs just after she nearly kills you ....

[R D S]

And on the phone, and chastising the monsters in the back.

[Jock]

It was always obvious that you 'live' in a council 'estate' slum with all the other unionists. '

[Jock]

Very unlikely indeed.

He didnt say that the Merc is a plug in hybrid or ev.

[Colin Bignell]

I think my ML500 was about 2.3 tonne. The specs for the GL series put them at just under 2.5 tonne. However, mashing the accelerator on something that can do 0-60 in 6 seconds (or 7.6 in the slower GL models) will get it moving quite quickly in very short order.

[soup]

Doesn't have to have a normally spectacular acceleration.

My hybrid accelerates like a stabbed rat, when the throttle is 'kicked down' the engine and the motor are both commanded to accelerate the car. And as it is very light (in the order of .8 Tonnes). Giving it a fantastic power to weight ratio, in just the very 'pushing the wrong pedal' scenario discussed else thread.

[JNugent]

If all the "victim" cars had been parked on their owners' driveways, they probably wouldn't have been damaged. ;-)

[The Natural Philosopher]

I have altogether written off two cars. In both cases at less than 30mph

[Andrew]

And sideways too, if the road is in any way greasy

Do 4x4 SUV's have 'torque steer' issues like some FWD cars do ?.

[Andrew]

Suspiciously light for a hybrid. Make/model ??

[Andrew]

If the car is only worth scrap anyway (but road legal and safe) that is quite easy to do.

Any impact at more than 5mph with an immovable object will do expensive damage. Fixing a scratch these days is about £250

[Dave Plowman (News]

You'd have to re-design this part of London, then. Built before cars.