Runaway BMW idiot driver

[codprawn]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/

Just listend to this audio about a bloke whos BMW accelerator jammed - car was getting up to 135mph on the A1 - he had to drive on the hard shoulder for miles. He phoned the Police and they called out the helicopter etc.

He reckoned the car wouldn't go into neutral and the pedal was jammed to the floor. He also reckoned that the brakes were managing to slow him to about 70mph but were then smoking!!! he travelled about 60miles. He ended up crashing into a roundabout.

Never heard such bollocks in my life - when the woman reporter asked him why he didn't just turn the engine off he said it was because he would have lost all control including the power steering!!!

Now surely even with modern over the top electronics on BMWs you will still have steering with the engine switched off??? Unfortuantely it didn't say which BMW it was.

They even had a woman racing driver??? on who said he did all the right things - she said it wasn't a good idea to turn off the engine because you would have no power steering!!!

Has the world gone mad????

[John Kennett]

Originally Posted by codprawn

Has the world gone mad????

It would seem so.

Defies belief! Sounds like BS to me . . .

John

[ADS]

That link doesn't work but you can launch the player by clicking on the link to the story, bottom right hand corner.
Haven't had a chance to watch it yet, but looks interesting, not sure how the pedal could get stuck down apart from the carpet. We had a beemer 330d for 3yrs (excellent car) and the accelerator was an interesting design, may have been drive by wire, not sure how it could have got stuck down.

Alex


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/4796264.stm

[codprawn]

Just fixed link to main page.

What amazed me was the advice given not to turn the engine off because you would lose control. Also no matter what vehicle it is the brakes are more powerful than the engine!!!

[ADS]

In this main news article: BBC News,

It states the car as a 98R BMW 318 Auto, whilst a nice car its hardly the top of the BMW tree and I very much doubt it was fitted with the latest electronics, whislt it may have had Power steering im sure im certain that you could still steer (whilst moving) as long as the ignition was on to disable the steering lock. I very much doubt this car had any form of electronic braking assistance being a low end model and the old shape 3 series. Finally, parkers guide quotes the top speed of this model as 124MPH, 135MPH is absolute rubbish.

Alex

98R BMW 318 auto parkers guide

[Jimbob]

i would wait for the technical findings

If i was in trouble i am not sure i would switch off the ignition, just like that, it is very hard to steer in a PAS car, go try it somewhere like an airfield.

[Hugh Jardon]

if it was a 318 auto then i am sure that stomping on the brakes would stop it as that engine would not pull the skin off a rice pudding. smoking brakes would be fine it is just when they fade that care is needed.

next time you are driving stick your foot to the floor then put the brakes on full and see what happens.

i for one would have used brakes and hand brake, then turned the ignition off when slow enough and safe enough

[Jimbob]

i the mail, i think it says the breaks failed as well

[tcwozere]

Didn't this happen with a truck driver 3-4 yrs ago on the M11? Fairly sure he was later prosecuted, and was found to suffer from Munchausen's syndrome..

[Nate]

Originally Posted by tcwozere

Didn't this happen with a truck driver 3-4 yrs ago on the M11? Fairly sure he was later prosecuted, and was found to suffer from Munchausen's syndrome..

Absolutely correct - nutter was praised by Plod at the time for keeping calm in a crisis, problem turned out to be all in his head tho...

Didn't think you'd get 135mph out of a 318 - used to be hard enough getting that out of my old 535 Sport!