I should win an award!!!

[tony2002]

One of my first cars was a 1979 Trans Am, It had t-tops, and I had a Mullett! I was pulling onto a portion of route 1 (North shore folks know this road) that you need to do practically light speed in order to not get rear-ended. I hadn't locked down the driver's top and as soon as I pulled out onto the road, the centrifugal force pulled that top and turned it into a giant ninja throwing-star. It found a mark on the side of a contractor's van that was in the travel lane.

What a giant mess that was, and that top was a PITA to replace.

[Justin76]

I know the feeling (stupid, that is). I did the same with a HOOD on my 02.. I (stupidly) figured speaker wire at the front and being latched at the back would be enough, but once I got up to speed, WHOOSH!

Like you, I looked in my rearview in time to see the chaos... Thankfully it didn't go through someone's windshield. I could've killed a bunch of people. Instead, a semi ran over it, and completely flattened it.

I pulled over, ran and grabbed the thing, dragged it to the side of the freeway. Destroyed. And that was after I'd spent probably 20 hours sanding it to bare metal and getting it into epoxy primer. Urgh.

Well, we learned our lesson, eh? No more driving 02's with untethered parts! ;-)

This wouldn't have happened to be in the summer of 2000 or 2001 on the connection from HWY 24 to 680 in Lafayette/Walnut Creek would it?

I had to avoid a bouncing hood on the way to summer school in my '02...

[nbristow01]

Picture this, 25 sheets of roof plywood in back of my beatup 78 ford truck. In rush hour in downtown Dallas. I have to stop in middle of an intersewction due to a freak running the red. So I punch it after he goes by. the plywood was the type witht eh shiny foil on it.....well its slick to so the entire load slid out of my truck into the intersection. ABout 7 billion pissed people honking and flipping me off. Finally a few guys helped me load this stuff back up

[Chris_B]

When I was a kid, my first car was a "bug-eyed" Sprite. On that car, the entire front end sheet metal was one monolithic piece, including the bug-eyes (headlights). The front latch didn't work, but had never been a problem while driving because the front end was pretty heavy and provided a bit of downforce while at speed.

One dark night I was racing a friend down the mountain (Hwy 9 from summit to Saratoga, for you SF Bay area folks). I had worked up a pretty good head of steam (maybe, 60 MPH) through some short straightaways, and hit a dip in the road. The hood popped up enough to be caught by the airstream, and the hood along with the headlights flipped straight up in the air. Did I mention that car had the worst brakes in the world?

It was so dark that I couldn't see the road. My buddy in front of me just kept driving, so pretty soon I couldn't see anything in front of me, hanging out over the door (car had no windows...). It was unbelievable luck that I did not run directly into a tree or off an embankment (no roll bar and no seat belts...).

[ought2]

Just think of all the herd-thinning we've all survived!

[Armond]

my wife almost killed me when the tall boy dresser we purchased from Ethan Allen leaned on it's side off the truck,was dragged on the freeway and eventually fell off my truck soon after I crossed the Golden Gate Bridge. I thought I had that thing secured... luckily, nobody was right behind me or it would have been a disaster....now I get people to deliver the furniture.

Woops

[haromich]

Now I see why we're so enamoured with the '02s... they're the only vehicles that have survived our antics!

[CutteRug]

CutteRug's moronic hood debacle

This wouldn't have happened to be in the summer of 2000 or 2001 on the connection from HWY 24 to 680 in Lafayette/Walnut Creek would it?

I had to avoid a bouncing hood on the way to summer school in my '02...

Negative. It happened Southbound 101 coming down the hill in Marinwood (northern Marin county). I think it was spring, 2009. You can still see the hood immortalized in my project blog "My '75 Can o Worms". It's the one in black epoxy primer. Needless to say, I've had to strip and prime another hood since then.

[thehackmechanic]

About 25 years ago I was driving this total shitbox winter beater 1600. I'd just bought it and slapped on rims with studded snows on all four corners. Unfortunately I apparently hadn't tightened down the lug nuts on one of the wheels. For the record, you have about three seconds from the time you hear that rumbling noise and think "wonder if it's the lug--" until the wheel comes off. It was the right rear wheel. BANG went the car as it skidded on the drum. And then (and this is the good part) THE WHEEL PASSES ME, hits a curb, jumps about eight feet in the air, and lands in someone's hedge, very narrowly missing a plate glass window. I had to knock on the lady's door and say "uh, I need to retrieve my wheel from your hedge." As Marty Feldman said in Young Frankenstein, "act casual; say nothing."

Fast forward 25 years. My son Ethan calls me to say that he's ok but a wheel fell off the Geo Metro -- that he must've forgotten to torque it down when he put on the snows. "How could I have been so STUPID!" he said. He was so happy when I told him "been there done that."

[ArdenK]

Note To Self ..... NEVER Tail Gate a fellow 02er!

[thehackmechanic]

Pour yourself a drink. Sit. Read. Laugh. I read this many hears ago; was glad to find it again.

http://www.voodoodeville.com/OldSite/id36.htm

[thehackmechanic]

Pour yourself a drink. Sit. Read. Laugh. I first read this many years ago; was glad to find it again.

http://www.voodoodeville.com/OldSite/id36.htm

[Anschauer]

I had a very similar thing happen to me personally - posted it in a similar thread last year here:

http://www.bmw2002faq.com/component/option,com_forum/Itemid,57/page,viewtopic/t,324400/highlight,cj8/

[mcompact]

Pour yourself a drink. Sit. Read. Laugh. I first read this many years ago; was glad to find it again.

In my late teens I too was run over- by this vehicle:

I didn't walk away, but eight weeks later I was back at school(thank the Lord their was no permanent impairment). I learned that you never assume that a heavy equipment operator actually sees you...

[jgerock]

I'll add a few to this list:

1) In about 1989, I was driving back to my college apartment from the Food Lion in Charlotte, NC when a pickup truck going the opposite way dumped an aluminum extension ladder from the bed into the road. The ladder somehow bounced and turned sideways. A poor soul in a Ford Taurus ran over it and the front wheels made the ladder sit upright. The Taurus was riding on the ladder with it's front wheels up in the air for a bit until the driver stopped. The ladder wasn't even tied to the pickup.

2) About 5 years ago, I was on the way to work (in VA) and a pickup truck with shell going the other way with a load of plywood stopped hard at a traffic light. His entire load of at least 15 sheets of plywood shot into the busy intersection. The wood was secured across the truck and not front to back (must have been using the same "kite string" as Blunt).

3) Some years ago, my wife was driving home from work on New York Avenue in DC. A small orange cone somehow got wedged under her Honda Accord, then released and popped up a mile later (upright), surprising the driver behind her.