I agree. There is no possibility of shearing the vehicle in two pieces as shown in that photo, no matter how fast the opposing vehicle was travelling. The unitbody construction won't allow a failure of this type.

I wouldn't be surprised if it's a reconstructed vehicle from two good halves.

I can't imagine anyone would sell a car composed of two halves welded together ... but I guess there's no accounting for morals... I suspect it's more likely that our reporter got it wrong, or the police report was wrong. It just doesn't make sense, unless it was hit by an Amtrak Accela train. And how could the dragster drive off after that much impact? It does seem a weird way to cut open a car to rescue someone, but maybe she was thrown from her seat and into the middle of the car, and they needed to get her out from the middle. This news broke early today, so I'm surprised there isn't more detail by now in terms of how the car got that way.

It doesn't take a physics major to sense that something is off about the dynamics of the crash ... which is why I'm totally WOWED by this one, for now at least.

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Actually, it's quite a common practice. Two vehicles that are trashed can be put together and one vehicle with some value is the result. If it's done "properly" then the vehicle is perfectly acceptable. However, properly welding sheet metal so that it has the same strength as the parent is not an easy task. Proper doubling strips are required along the entire length of the joint.

If it was hit by a train, it would not shear in half cleanly as shown in this photo. In fact, I'd bet that the train might crush is badly from one side, but the resultant wreck would remain largely intact.

The vehicle that drove off, the Nissan, was not involved in the accident. That vehicle was drag racing the Saturn.

The rescuers would never cut an entire vehicle in half to rescue someone. It would take them way too much time for this. As you mentioned in a separate post, they certainly wouldn't cut the vehicle in half and then move one section 30 feet from the opposite section.

Nope, this vehicle was most certainly assembled from two halves or the story is fabricated.

I'd like to see a picture of the Saturn that hit it hard enough to split a W126 in half.

The first thing I thought was that the chassis must have had a lot of rust, but I don't see much visible.

Ken300D

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1982 300D at 351K miles
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buddy of mine has just such a unit,it's a 2000 buick park ave ultra.it was assembled from 2 cars from the same wreck.a 2000 buick rearended a 2000 buick so they cut the front off the one and the back off the other.the body shop that did it does lots of em.

I dunno, Guys ... it looks too clean ... perhaps the tow crew cut it apart to clear it from the telephone/power pole ... so they wouldn't have to drop the pole ... the roof area and the bottom side cuts look too straight - and, without a lot of stretching ...

Don't ya think the pole would have sustained more damage?

I don't see any fluids .... no tire marks, nothing on the curb area ...

Maybe the car was damaged elsewhere and then the back portion was stored in the median to get it out of the way? Again, I don't see any tracks of any sort - the grass doesn't even look damaged ...

Just doesn't add up ...

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Any pics of the Saturn? I would expect for such a thing to happen the Saturn would have to have been doing 100mph if not more. At those speeds there should be parts of it everywhere. But there should be a ball of Saturn somewhere with human remains. That W126's looks really clean, considering its an old lady she probably had it a long time. I bet the force of the accident drove it into a tree and split it.

Also the jaws of life ect can do that without much trouble. I have seen it done before with an early 80's Buick. Usually they just cut the roof off, they wouldn't cut it in half unless they had to, takes longer. With the jaws you can have the roof off of any car real fast.


Tragic accident none the less, I hope the find the other guy and give him 20 years.

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see if ya can get some more pics of that one bodhi

That pic of the 190 is exactly how I would expect a 126 to look in an accident like that....and like Brian said, probably a little less crushed.

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it is interesting that there is no fuel spillage under the rear section. and the rear seat bottom lying there in the street, it looks as if there was no damage to it, which doesn't make sense with this type of accident.

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That 190 pic reminds me of the crashes I saw all over the place in Kuwait - they have a ton of high speed crashes over there due to lack of enforcement and bad technique - they just leave the hulks at the side of the road until all investigations are over.

John

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OBK#24

I doubt the car was anything but an old lady's low milage Merc bought new.

Aren't there any other people in here who are police, fire and rescue, or EMT's?? It's not uncommon to find cars cut in half in major accidents, and they sometimes seem to have been cut with a knife. It's bizarre and unexpected, certainly, but not unusual no matter the make.

Unibody cars have no frame structure, per se, and are constructed in pieces. The joints between pieces are natural points of seperation and this one doesn't look unusual at all.

Late manufacture cars built under the more stringent side impact requirements do seem to do better. Back then there was limited attention paid to the damage occuring in side impact events.

It likely was done by side impact with the wooden pole from the resting places of the pieces.

Here's how a 190 holds up against extreme side impact crashes. Similar area of impact, too.

....

Wait a second. The DNS is kind of inappropriate.

Second try...

Attached Thumbnails

 

That's exactly what I'd expect out of a W126........maybe less damage for the same impact.

You could hit the vehicle in the side with an Amtrak train and it would not split in half.........