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How Were You Christened?

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Mickey Richaud

Mickey Richaud

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Nope - not a religious post.

Over on the Triumph Forum, there's a post about a daughter's first accident. Got me thinking about my first time. Had just gotten my license at 15 (Louisiana), and was in the family car - a '60 Karmann Ghia. While backing out of a convenience store parking spot, I went right into a bread truck! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/blush.gif Never knew a chrome bumper guard could break like that!

(Maybe it was a religious experience - I remember saying something about the divine! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/devilgrin.gif)

Any others?

Mickey
 
Mickey, I creased the right front fender of a Healey 3000 while parking a friends '53 Plymouth. Did a whopping $40 worth of damage to the Healey, which seemed the end of the world considering the state of my finances in 1964!
Jeff
 
At 17 I buggered mother's Falcon (144 CID, column three-speed) when as I was driving from one football game to another as a "stringer" photog for the local newspaper: four football games every Friday nite! Had a "date" along for the ride, a "bunny" jumped in front of us and I went boonie stomping to miss the stupid critter. Date was appreciative, but I had to repair the damage to the front end and undercarriage. BAH!
 
First accident? WHEW! There were so many as a teenager....the first though, I think, was in my 1950 Pontiac (straight-8, big 4-door with the lighted Indian chief hood ornament). I was delivering newspapers after school. I tossed papers out the window with my left arm & drove with my right arm simultaneously grabbing rolled papers from the stack on the seat next to me (talk about multi-tasking!); I had one of those big knobs on my steering wheel that I used for driving - you know the type: it rotated as you turned the wheel allowing one-handed operation. Well, I attempted to do both - toss & drive - while making a left turn onto another street, but I kept turning right into a small white church sitting fairly close to the sidewalk. Church steps met the fender of the Pontiac: steps 1; fender 0! Stepdad angry (& I'm using 'angry' out of deference to Basil's no profanity rule!). I had to pay to have the fender repaired as well as having the bricks on the steps relayed.
 
I've been lucky (knocking on wood)... I've never been in a bad accident. I've seen lots of them happen in front of me though... worst one was watching a 18-wheel tanker flip over (scared me because I was thinking fuel truck) about 100 foot in front of my car. Turned out he was hauling liquid sulfer. I also watched a head on collision where neither driver survived.
 
I was 16 - driving my dad's 1964 Buick LeSabre.

Car in front of me stopped at a yellow light. Yes...it was yellow...I didn't stop for the yellow light.

BANG!

Resulted in very little damage to either car....and a whiplash lawsuit from the passengers in the car I hit.
 
I was 16 driving home from work in my 1972 Midget. Car is front of me stopped short & I swerved off the road into a concrete post. Did some decent damage to the underside & bent the bumper in half. Car held up well. I got it home & parked it head in. For some strange reason I took out a piece of paper & wrote "totaled" across it and hung it over the rear plate. Mom came home & almost had a heart attack. I did not have luck with that car so she was always worried about me. 16 years old with a 1500 lb car, what were we thinking!!
 
nothing after 45 years not even a ticket, now my son on the other hand !!!!
 
Once... In 13 years of driving, I believe it may have happened about 10 years ago...

We all do this, the person in front of us is turning left at the lights and waiting for traffic to clear to turn left, so I went to the right around the car to keep heading straight... It was at a traffic light, and the car in front of me (on the right side as I went around) was an older VW Scirroco... The driver didn't have a turn signal on but was turning right and also didn't seem to be on the brakes (standard transmission likely)... So I had a very low-speed rear end collison with it, the Scirocco had a damaged tail light, and I had very light accident damage on the front-end (my car was basically a beater car anyway)

After exchanging information we parted ways, I was later told by the other driver that the Scirocco tail light was a $800 part or something like that (ouch!), I wanted to do a cash settlement but had to go through insurance, and got a letter awhile later stating that the settlement had been closer to $400... At which point I wasn't pleased, as I probably could have paid out that much cash without going through insurance... Ah well, I've been clean since then /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif
 
I was a college sophmore at my local university driving to school one morning. Rather than taking my usual through town route, I decided to hop on the freeway and get off at the exit closest to the university. It was a pretty close exit, with just a few intersections before reaching the university.

The drive was uneventful, and I got off the freeway and made it through one of lights. The next one was red and I stopped, first in line in my lane. When the light turned green, I got on the gas and was moving, just in time to see a small pickup truck in front of me. I hit the brakes, but ended up hitting the right rear corner of the truck.

The other driver got out, apologized and admitted fault. The crash tore up his rear bumper and damaged the bed of his truck. The front right corner of my car, a 1980 Olds Cutlass Supreme coupe, was badly damaged. A police officer was close by and took the police report. The other driver and his passengers were high school football players on their way to the newspaper office for a photo op. I doubt they made it, and I was late for class.

The car was totalled, but we kept it and sold it for a few hundred bucks. I hated to see that car go. I'd planned to stuff a 350 V8 under the hood and paint it black. My mother was unhappy because the car had been her last new car.

I've had one other crash since then, and that driver was at fault as well. My driving record is clean as well.
 
I was working for an independant shop and was test driving a customers Grand caravan that I had just replaced the computer in (how do you like it so far?) Well, when I got downtown in Ithaca I stopped for a light and glanced in the mirror to see what had become of the tailgater that had been behind me. What had become of him was that he thought I was going to blow through the tail end of the yellow light (I was driving a customers car so I wasen't going to risk a ticket) and was speeding up to get through with me. He wound up just getting through me instead. He hit the back of the van so hard it blew out all the back windows and before I knew what had happened I was laying flat on my back (the back of the drivers seat broke) in the oncoming turning lane on the other side of the intersection.
"He" wound up being an un-licenced ex-con (served time for a fatal drunk driving accident) driving his brothers 4x4 Ranger.
shaken, but unhurt, I called my boss to explain that I'd been in an accident. his response was classic.
Boss "was it your fault?"
Me "No"
Boss " Ok, I'll send a tow truck."
Of course both cars were totalled.
Only been in one since then. other driver ticketed, both cars totalled, and no injuries.
But I have to say, I'm a far mor cautous driver for the experiences.
 
My first; I was following a girl to her house and it was raing a bit....my MGA slid into the back of her car at a stoplight...No damage to her tanker, knocked out my headlights. Second; a drunk in a cargo van ran a red light and I slammed into him with my Etype at about 45mph...Face went through the wood steering wheel and I've still got scars to prove it. third: In almost gridlock traffic another Camaro pushed my Camaro into a Civic....No damage to either Camaro, Civic totaled.

Aside from the Etype...I was pretty ticked when someone ran into my wife in the Caddy a month after I bought it! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cryin.gif
 
[ QUOTE ]
while parking a friends '53 Plymouth.

[/ QUOTE ]


That is weird. My first accident was also a "backing up" accident in my Dad's 1953 Plymouth. How cool that car was.
If it could've talked, it would have told some stories!
 
[ QUOTE ]

Boss "was it your fault?"
Me "No"
Boss " Ok, I'll send a tow truck."


[/ QUOTE ]

Kinda makes ya wonder what he would've said if it was the other way around.
 
Had my first one last November. Stopped in an intersection, some guy in a RAM3500 pickup floors it from 2-lanes away and accelerates straight into the rear-right of the Miata.
 
Before license: Racing my Renault Dauphine against a friend's Simca Etoille in the woods roads behind my parent's house (we were both 15). He spun and I "T-boned" him. Both cars lost one front wheel. Both "skidded" home on three wheels for hack-job repairs. No seat belts so I flew out of the car, but survived. The Renault had a milk-crate for a driver's seat (we had put the bucket seats in my Dad's boat).

After license: At age 17 in the parking lot of Trenton State College in my '58 VW. Demonstating "slides" to my friends:
"Hey Guys! Watch This!"
Rolled Over. Destroyed the thing.
 
My first accident happened in my first car...a '57 black Buick Roadmonster. It happened at an intersection out in the boonies. I don't remember the specifics, but the right front fender on the Buick got dented in a bit. This was three days before I was to trade in the car on a '63 TR4! I couldn't take that Buick anymore. I had a friend of mine help me straighten out the fender, and we repainted it with some Dupli-color spray cans. This same friend became a teacher in HS auto body classes, and is still helping me straighten out fenders 43 years later. Only this time, it's on my TR3 resto. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/yesnod.gif
 
Slid under a high truck that stoped short with my Bugeye in Hawaii. He ran, cost me 30 bucks, a lot of money back then but my neighbor had a body shop.
 
My first was when I was 18. I was leaving my girlffiend's house in my 66 Ford pickup. I didn't see a stopsign until it was too late. I remember thinking I got lucky as it was a busy street, and right then I was T-boned by a 356 Porsche. Even though I ran the intersection I didn't get a ticket, and fortunately no one was hurt, except for my wallet for the several years in insurance payments. Thankfully that was my first and last at fault accident, now I'm 46.

Cheers,

Rob
 
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