I had an experience similar to Tommy’s with my 72 Olds Cutlass in high school. The fortunate thing that saved my rear end was I had put so many junkyard transmissions into that jalopy that I had braced the driveshaft with coat hanger during one of these auto-tranny changes.
When my front ujoint did fail, I was instantly alerted with a cacaphony of slapping under the card as the driveshaft flailed around and hit the bottom of the car.
After seeing it was the u-joint I imagined later how ugly it would have been if that driveshaft planted into the road…