[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by Dadhawk

ARRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHH!

On the way to a ground breaking ceremony for a new building my company is building today (which means not my regular commute time, which also means if I had blown it off this wouldn't have happened) a lady in a Nissan Sentra decided that she needed to make a left turn between the truck in front of me and me.

Unfortunately, there wasn't nearly enough space, she stopped dead right in the middle of my lane. I slammed the brakes, kicking off ABS and we hit corner to corner at probably less than 5MPH (thankfully). I had no place to go right any further than I did (was about half out of my lane when we impacted).

There was no apparent damage to her car (of course).

The front bumper cover of the 86 is creased, scratched and popped loose right under the left headlight. I also think the impact managed to tweak my hood. (it's slightly raised and the gap doesn't look right, not nearly as close as the passenger side).

I get out and immediately determine 1) English is not her first language 2) its not her car and 3) she won't talk to me but calls her daughter instead. Fair enough. A quick call to 911 and a friendly police officer is soon on the scene. They collect the info from her, but can't give it to me, I have to wait for the police report (my insurance company says it's pretty SOP for them to do that, safety precaution so I don't go ballistic/stalker on her I suppose).

It could have been a lot worse. The lady had her grandkid (probably 18 to 24 months old) in the back seat, in a car seat, right up against the passenger door. Had she kept going, I would have hit her at much more impact and probably right in the kid's door. Doesn't matter who's fault it is, I would NOT want that to happen.

After I took the picture below I bent the slots back enough so they would slide under the top body work.

My insurance is going to give me a damage estimate tomorrow but I have to wait to file with her insurance company to avoid a deductible. no problem, car is perfectly drivable. There goes the "clean" CARFAX though, not that matters.

So, messed up bumper, have to deal with the hassle, and I missed free burgers, sausages and cookies at the groundbreaking!

Well that sucks! Missed free food.

I had the exact same scenario happen to me just before Christmas but I managed to stop about a 1/2 inch before I hit. Afterwards I thought "Shit I should have just tapped her and got a shiny new bumper". I now plan on keeping the car until it falls apart so the Crafax is meaningless to me.