It can be traumatising, depends on lots of factors though.

I wrecked a lot of cars when I was young and invulnerable, one of them being a Triumph GT6 with 1200miles on it, I had the car for 27hours, ... lost control in the rain and hit a utility pole (cracked) and a building (moved one wall), totalled the car but my passenger and I escaped without injury (somehow), he claims he saw 80mph on the speedo when we looped it. Damn lucky. I couldn't take a curve in the rain at speed for a long time, and even longer before I could ride passenger in the rain on a curve at speed (years).

Much later in life I was unlucky enough to have my family in the car when a drunk lost control and went airborn coming towards me, nothing I could do but stop and hope he would miss me, he didn't. My 4-year-old was sitting behind me and got the worse injuries, made me really emotional talking about it for at least a year afterwords, can't imagine how tough it would be to have someone die whether at-fault or otherwise, hope I never do.

Interesting to note that this was the mid-90s, I had bought for a family car an E-150 conversion van, with custom seating to protect for side impact, Ford was the only body-on-frame van in the '90s and the only double-wall-steel body, bought it for impact safety. It did it's job but even with its frame strength it was pretzeled and totaled, only 2years old. Ironically, my car, a '91 300TE 4matic which I bought because I considered it the safest station-wagon in the world (active and passive safety) no longer made me comfortable after the collision, too low and lightweight, sold it. Difficult to consider the frame-height and mass of a full-size truck/suburban type hitting your car in the door, but it happens. I bought a 40,000lb BlueBird Wanderlodge motorhome, figured the next drunk that pulls out in front of me is a bug on the windshield.

When I was young, it scared me, when I was older, it changed when and what I drive. I seldom take the family out late in the evening on Saturdays. It changes you permanently. Even more so when you're not at fault, makes you realize that at any moment it might be your "time".

- Jeff Miller
190DT