Nobrainer’s Think Tank

“No one understands how this man is alive,” quoth the mindless TV reporter. I mean, that wreck did look pretty bad.

(see video of the crash, it’s pretty cool. Or you can read more about it.)

“So why did he survive? There’s no good explanation. But Brian credits his faith and his Audi TT. He’s an Audi dealer.”

Well, you brainless whore for public attention, there is a good explanation. You may say he just got lucky. There are numerous ways to crash an overloaded, undermaintained truck, a bus, and an Audi that will result in the Audi driver dying a very gruesome death. There are just as many that involve no harm to anyone.

But that isn’t really a good explanation either. First, the Audi gets side-swiped by the truck. That’s always bad for your paint job, but it isn’t going to kill you. Also he wasn’t going all that fast, so his collision with the concrete barrier really wasn’t all that bad. From an engineering standpoint, I’ll estimate that he was doing 40 mph and hit the barrier at a 30º angle. That’s the equivalent of hitting something at 20 mph — as an extra safety benfit, it was 20 mph to be absorbed the corner of the car — probably the best place. (Although I think it was probably closer to 30 mph and 20º, which makes it more like a 10 mph impact). And I doubt that he was hit squarely from behind by the bus. Since all the vehicles were still moving forward, the relative velocities were probably 30 - 40 mph. A large part of the impact of the bus was also absorbed by the truck, which served as a protector for the car in this regard.

In short, the little Audi got smacked around, absorbing 3 moderate impacts. None was severe enough to really injure the driver or cause catastrophic structural damage, but enough to send it the junk yard.

But good explanations don’t sell commercials or miracles — something the allegedly “liberal” media sells, with good profits, every day.