So im on the way home from the airport today just after a big rain storm.

Im driving on one of the main thoroughfares in my town after an uneventful 100+ mile commute by road and im approaching a traffic light not 3 miles from my house.

The light is green, traffic is moderate but moving along at 40 - 45 miles per hour.

Im in the far left lane eastbound. there are 3 eastbound and 3 westbound lanes.

Suddenly the middle lane and the right lane slow down quite rapidly. I realize they probably see something i don't so im slowing down in a hurry as well.
As i approach the intersection there is an ambulance with an emergency crossing traffic and everyone is stopped so i stop too.

I look in the rear view mirror to ensure that everyone behind me is doing the buddy thing and stopping as well and here comes a Ford Explorer at full bore right up my tail pipe.

BAM!!!!

"expletive"

Now this would officially be one of a hand full of accidents i have unwittingly become a part of so im fairly familiar with what a serious low to medium speed impact feels like as well as the type of damage involved. Thats why im surprised that the airbags didnt deploy blasting that old familiar smell of talcum powder into my face. (This impact occurred over 5 hours ago and i still have a small head ache just to give you an idea of the impact)

I got out of the car to check things out.

One small dent on the license plate. Thats it. The explorer's bumper was caved a fair bit. I gave the rear bumper of my car a good tugging on by hand and it didnt budge. opened the trunk - everything worked smoothly with no damage to the interior compartment there. looked underneath the car - nothing appeared out of place.

I stepped back in absolute disbelief  scratching my head as to how i escaped the need to replace the entire arse end of my car!

How is it that the Explorer... an SUV took a fair bit of damage to the front end, and the suburban behind the Explorer who also chain collided the Explorer took a lot of damage to the front end. But i drive away from the scene of the accident without so much as a scratch?

I guess Chevy builds a good car and plastics play a large role in the absorption of impact forces.

All i can say is if your in the market for a car that gets about 30 miles per gallon, is a sporty drive, looks nice and has good impact ratings - go with the Chevy Cobalt  because i am impressed!

Do you have before and after measurements.... it might be a few inches shorter now than when it left the factory.

And there are no airbag sensors in the back... just the G meter that might be inactive due to the fact that you stopped.

There are many possible conditions and resaons that would result in such lop-sided damage. If it where me I would take the auto to a collision specialist before it's too late. There very well may damage unseen to the eye.

Mushroom_Farmer wrote on Apr 15^th, 2007 at 11:04pm:


agreed.  my mate was hit side on and there was no damage done to his car that he could see.  two days later his rear axle snaped.

British Army Land Rovers are built pretty much the same... I hit one about 10 years ago after it tried to join a dual carriageway I was on.. I hit it at about 65 MPH, he was probably just reaching 40... my van was a write off.. he had NO visible damage.  

On a side note, I hope his axle broke 2 days later as it was the most idiotic piece of driving I'd seen up until then..  

most definately since it was someone else's fault I would be taking it to a shop and having it inspected because there are so many little things that could go wrong now because of that and any one of those can mean bad things for you and if you don't at least get it looked at by someone now you could be losing any insurability that you might be able to claim from the other person...

just my two cents...

btw..I loved my chevy when I had one

I agree you may have a hidden problem:
Were you in gear?
Brakes?

Also: check the "cat". Friend of mine once had a very minor fender-bender in his old Celica... weeks later he had  stopped at a red light when his passenger said "I smell smoke". They looked down, and smoke was coming from every nook and cranny in the floor. They bailed (his friend had a flat case of  beer in his lap- he shot out from under it), called 911, watched the car go "woomf!" as the whole interior ignited, and by the time the FD got there minutes later the car had burned down to the rims. Fortunately, the tank didn't explode.
The culprit? the catalytic converter. It had been knocked askew in that little mishap, just enough so that it no longer radiated heat properly. Those things will get white-hot... potentially very dangerous.