What a Loss

[pdub]

One of the kids in Superman's house (he's 16) got a silver Gen 3 Trans Am some months ago. So proud of it, I caught him rubbing on it the the driveway one warm day. Kid was beaming. "Now I'm almost as cool as my dad." Sure enough.

Wrecked it Friday evening. Kid and his passenger are SO lucky to be alive. Good thing for seat belts. They were only shaken up. The car's in the driveway, oh my.

Chuck (Superman) showed me the photos from the scene.

Turned left off of US 64, onto the curvy road up into the mountains. Kid stopped in the road, did a burnout, didn't make the next curve and flew off the road sideways and hit a hardwood tree about 5 feet off the ground, heading down a cliff. Tree hit the car behind the driver's door, so the kids got out and looked at it and called everybody. Instead of a hit on the door and it's a different story.

[Dan Barlow]

Having just been in a similar situation ,trust me, even pine trees are hard. Glad he's o.k. Even after a month I can tell where the seat and the lap belt hit my chest and legs. Bruises have been gone for 2 weeks. Really sorry to here about the T/A also.

[moparmaniac07]

Yep, trees don't move.

Also, I think most 16 year olds should seriously consider just getting a beater until they wreck their first car. I wish I wouldn't have spent what seemed like a fortune at the time on my first (actually second, but first one road legal) car. $2500 down the drain for 2 months of driving. After you find the limits, you tend to be more careful. Glad no one was hurt.

[Dan Barlow]

Mopar, I think your think your right. I have some friends that don't get or help the kid get their own car. I find this crazy. I don't want them crashing the best car I have. And I'm talking about the wife's bravada .

[Deaf Bob]

Do what I did... Both kids' first cars were derby cars! Then they got road cars...

[JOES66FURY]

Thats why I have the $1000 beater pickup for my daughter. I will patch it together until she can afford to upgrade herself...I will only supply one vehicle.

[moparmaniac07]

Sure, there are some that don't wreck a car, but most do. I wrecked the one I bought. My brother smashed one that was my parents' (still had full coverage, and was under 2 months of having his license, so he beat me). Had a friend get t-boned and roll at 17. Both my sisters were on their 2nd car (whether or not it was their fault) by their 18th birthday. Again, not sayin' everybody that age will cause an accident, but probably 95% of new drivers will be involved in an accident (if even for the simple fact that they don't have the experience to avoid one). I wish my parents would have let me get the $500 Omni I wanted. I would have either had a GV overdrive or a running bike now if they did.

[Big Dave]

Teenagers do stupid things, I know first hand....I was one! Wreaked my beloved 1966 Chevelle as a freshmen in college over spring break. Sent back to school on Trailways bus, 12 hrs, I've never riden a bus since. Came home for summer break and was told I could drive the car again once it was repaired. 24 hrs later it rolled out of the paint shop. When I traded that car in 1970 for a Mercury Cyclone 429, 4 speed, the only part of the body that was orginal was my door and roof. That's how I learned to work on cars. When on to racing on short tracks in Alabama....my driving skills improved.

[Loren]

I spent much of my time my senior year re-drivelining and re-painting a Vega GT, my second car...and then traveled the state with it that summer...a hundred miles or so from returning back home I didn't quite see the guy stopped on the freeway in front of me in time. I believe I cracked both the taillights of a '72 Mercedes. The guy behind me did much better, and followed by shortening my pretty Vega by about two feet. After having had a very serious argument with my parents before I left, I had to call Dad to come to Santa Barbara from L.A., with a tow chain and pry bar to rescue me. Then I got to sit in the yard and stare at my crumpled car.

I was into another car pretty quickly, Vega bodies were cheap...but it was a lesson. Or, it could've been a lesson. I think the lesson for me was that if you're going to wreck a car, at least do it in a more spectacular fashion, with like more speed and guardrails and mild injuries and such, but that is another story...dammit if Dad didn't have to come drag me home after that one too...really, I'm still sure I was his favorite kid...

[Brian Lohnes]

Giving a 16 year old kid not named Joey Logano a third gen Firebird is akin to handing him a loaded gun. Thankfully he only nicked a toe with it.

[PatricksDad]

Giving a 16 year old kid not named Joey Logano a third gen Firebird is akin to handing him a loaded gun. Thankfully he only nicked a toe with it.

Sorry, Brian, but I've been giving my kids loaded guns since they were 12.

Still undecided about the car thing, though.

[Supersport350]

Here is my smashed up Firebird. Got it at 15, totaled by 19 when another driver blew a stop sign. Didnt have a scratch on me. I disagree with it being a bad idea getting a new driver such a car. Without it, I'm not sure I would have become the gearhead I am today.

[Ron Ward]

Giving a 16 year old kid not named Joey Logano a third gen Firebird is akin to handing him a loaded gun. Thankfully he only nicked a toe with it.

My dad gave me my first shotgun when I was 8 years old. My shooting and my driving have one thing in common: I have never hit anything I didn't intend to hit.

It's all about respect. With cars, as with firearms, you have to respect them. That respect is taught and learned. It's up to the parents to teach it and the kids to learn it.


Ron

[Scott Liggett]

A lot of my friends trashed their first car at 16. Some trashed their second and third. I guess I was one of the unusual kids who never wrecked a car. Maybe just lucky. It is not like I was a rule follower behind the wheel.

Just glad no one was hurt.

[Gary 351C]

When my best friend and I got our first car at 16 it was a huge deal. We were the quiet, geeky types without girlfriends so our cars were our whole world and we took driving very seriously. That's not to say we didn't have scrapes, mine was run into once and his was hit a few times. We knew guys that wadded up their cars doing stupid crap and maybe seeing that made us more careful, or maybe we were just lucky nothing bad happened.