It looks like something big went through the windshield. People have been killed by deer this way.
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Possibly, not remotely unusal to encounter a deer on that stretch of road. My family has lived in that area for 40yrs now and you have to get much closer to town for a road with more than 2 lanes.
I live in a fairly dense suburb and it’s a rare day that I don’t see several deer, and at any time of the day too.
Where this happened it’s more like one house on 2-5 acres of land, although not far from a couple developments. Lots of habitat for deer to live in. I’m practically next door to all the car dealers but i’ve seen a number of deer in the green belts around the development.
If you look closely, the broken edges of the windshield have a charred appearance, and the passenger-side mirror looks like it might have melted.
@wolyrobb … did a fire break out as a result of the collision?
I have noticed an increasing number of single-car accidents in the news over the past 4 or 5 years, and–most likely–they were almost all the result of either dangerous driving behaviors or the driver nodding-off behind the wheel. Of course, there is also the possibility of the driver trying to avoid a deer.
The most disturbing one-car accident in my area involved a young teacher who died when her Ford Edge hit a tree, in broad daylight, on a totally straight road. The police theorized that she was trying to avoid a deer. The most mysterious part was that her vehicle caught fire, even though the collision damage was less severe than what we see in the picture above. Nobody was ever able to figure out why it caught fire, but the fire is what apparently killed her.
In drivers Ed we were told when a choice between a tree and an animal, the animal is softer.
A co-worker had a deer jump out in front of her. She said the deputies were more interested in finding the deer than her condition.
Impossible the sun visor isn’t melted at all. It obviously went through a lot of trees.
Could be a murder. Drive the person’s car in to a tree at 10 MPH. Put the body in the driver’s seat, put some gasoline in the engine compartment and light it, then close the hood and leave the scene through the woods or on a bicycle or something.
The only way someone could die in such a minor accident is if they didn’t use a seat belt. But even that wouldn’t do it. The person would have to have died while driving and then just kept going and hit the tree. Crash tests are performed without the engines running so there no real testing to see if the vehicle will catch fire after a crash.
There was a cargo jetliner crash that looks really suspicious like this. It went down short of the runway in landing configuration but there is was no intrusion in to the cockpit and no fire but both pilots were killed.
Racers are taught to look for escape paths. Failing brakes, oil on tne pavement, crashes in front of you can all conspire to run you off tne track when you are at the very limit of traction.
The same is true of driving on the road as @Purebred points out. Drivers should be aware of escape paths that are void of hard, immoveable objects. Hitting the car in front of you squarely is preferrable to hitting a telephone pole. Rolling across a nice grassy open median is better as well as long as you treat it like ice - stay straight, steer lightly and slowly, foot off the gas.
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It could be, except that it wasn’t.
The tree in question was located between two houses, and at least one of the homeowners stated that she came outside immediately upon hearing the impact. At that point, she stated that flames were already coming out from under the crumpled hood.
Wrong again! The integrity of all systems, especially the fuel system, are tested after crash testing. Manufacturers are VERY concerned about fire. They just don’t want them happing in their test labs… OSHA, you know… but the pressurized fuel systems are simulated.
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… and you’re surprised because… ?
IIRC, the cops eventually referred the case to NHTSA because it appeared that there shouldn’t have been a fire under those circumstances.
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that’s what I was taught by my father… who did not really mind his 20+ years old car to fail on hydraulics time to time 
when I was allowed to work on that car, first I fixed his parking brake… just felt as a quick-fix
later, I replaced all the critical pieces one by one and that car was sold at 26 or 27 years of age and still in good shape
safety concerns at that time (80s) ? not whatsoever! just get me from point A to B
Man, that’s awful. Sorry to hear that.
Motorcyclists are taught (or hopefully learn) to look for escape paths too. I still do. I actually used an escape path yesterday on the way home from work, coincidentally. I was driving my truck on a stretch of 2 lane behind other cars. Traffic was unusually slow and there was a car pretty close behind me. Traffic started to speed up, so I assumed someone up front had turned off the highway. I started to speed up and then noticed I was closing in fast on the car directly in front of me who was now almost stopped, waiting for traffic in order to turn left. No signal, no brake lights or anything. I jetted off the road into an industrial drive on the right rather than trying to stop abruptly and hope I wouldn’t get rear ended.
I haven’t been behind anyone with no brake lights in a while. I realized I kind of tend to look beyond the car directly in front of me until I see a brake light or a turn signal. So, I’ll have to watch that, I guess.
I’m not sure whose fault that would’ve been had I hit them. Mine, I guess.
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Good job. The last time I encountered someone with no working brake lights, I realized it just as I heard the sound of my car slamming into the back of theirs and felt the force of the impact. Luckily, I wasn’t injured, though the court still found it my fault.
Granted, I was much younger then, in my early 20’s, so I was driving beater cars and paying sky-high insurance regardless. Now, I probably would be able to avoid such an accident.
when the show cops was on, I remember thinking to myself that I can not believe how many people are out there driving with no drivers license or insurance.
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Yup. You must be in control of your car at all times. 99.999% of the time the driver in rear is at fault.
I hope you don’t ever get to close behind me my brake lights work but I have been pulled over three times in the last few years for no brake lights twice at the same place coming of a four lane with a right turn lane with a 90 degree turn onto the road I was turning onto I drive a manual transmission and am in the habit of downshifting as much as possible before touching the brakes s all three times they saw the brake lights worked when I pulled over two of then asked me what was going on the third one noticed the stick shift and shook his head and explained why he stopped me all three apologiized and sent me on my way.
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Hopefully you’d at least signal that you were going to turn left to give me a heads up you were slowing or stopping.
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Yes I do use my signals.