Helo,
Yesterday, in a thunderstorm on a three lane highway, I had a new Nissan Frontier PU do an amazing ballet act ahead of me at about 60mph. The driver had just passed me, I was at 50mph(the posted limit)or so in my W115 200 and could feel that there was a lot of water on the roadway.
He was visibly annoyed at me for *holding him up*, but about 200 yards down the road, the thing hydroplaned and hit two cars, then the median guardrail, flipped up and crashed back down on it's right side, slid along and finally flipped on to the roof, collapsing the screen pillars.
I had no time to think, I just avoided the carnage as best as I could WITHOUT hitting the brakes in a panic and made it through without a mark on my car, it did get a bit sideways, but stayed more or less pointed in the direction I needed it to go.
I did stop about half mile down from the mess.
The PU driver was seriously injured because he was not wearing his seat belt(mandatory here).
You would think that if the idiot was born and bred in the tropics, he would know that it is possible to hydroplane in rain around here without really trying too hard.
I made sure that the traffic cop investigating knew that he was way over the speed limit and showed no signs of slowing when the PU began sliding out of control.
I am amazed at the response and control that the W115 demonstrated, never thought that with the *slow* manual steering I would get out of that in one piece, but it did.
I have always thought that Mercedes are very good cars for average drivers and excellent cars for experienced drivers, this incident only reinforces my conviction.

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Nachi11744

Maybe it wasn't the car, but the driver?

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1985 CA 300D Turbo , 213K mi

Glad your are OK!

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J.H.
'86 300E

I found it surprising that the roof pillars collapsed. I thought all cars had adapted the design concept that those pillars should support the weight of the vehicle.
I drive a 10 year old Nissan PU for work, and was amazed how easily the front fender folded up in a 5 mph accident
I'll keep the 300SD, thank you.

I do not rate my driving skills very highly, in fact, in the last ten years, I have become a lazy driver, often with only one or two fingers on the steering wheel, paying more attention to The Rippingtons, Bob James, Sarah McCaughlan et al on my ancient cassette player/radio/CD combo
The tyres are......Kelly Explorers that are made in Indonesia, only tyre I could find in the 185/80x14 size in Malaysia, the local Continental and Michelin importers refused to order 185/80x14 tyres, they cannot understand that there is actually a 80 profile and Mercedes existed before they were born
I think because the road was soaking wet, the PU slid along on the roof for a bit, just folding the pillars.
Years back, I was driving a BMW Six series and was t-boned by a 3.5 ton truck(box van type thing), the truck actually was worse off, the driver had broken feet and bruises, the Bimmer's left front strut tower was pushed in and of course, as with any older BMW in an accident, the radiator was busted

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Nachi11744