It was a 5 vehicle pile up and the irony was that the Creta who braked suddenly causing this tragedy fled away.
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Few Friends of mine and myself planned a weekend getaway to Yercaud from Chennai over the weekend of 12th July and It was a lovely trip until this tragic event happened on the way back home in GST road near Melmaruvathur. This was my 5th roadtrip in Scorpio-N and the vehicle behaved flawlessly be it in the flats or on the hills. I was absolutely in love with the ride until I was stuck in the dreaded weekend return traffic in Ulundurpet.
It was mad traffic with very little space to stretch the legs and vehicles cutting you from all the angles. All the vehicles were cruising at a constant speed of around 50kmph and even if I intentionally keep a healthy distance from the vehicle in front, I was harassed by the vehicles behind by flashing their lights to fill the gap. Over the period, I gave in and was closely tailing the vehicles in front, and I truly regret for doing so.
All happened in a flash – I heard a loud bang, then another and before I could come to my senses, vehicle ahead (Chevy Beat) bashed and stopped abruptly, I slammed the brakes as hard as I could but still ended up with a big bang. It was a 5 vehicle pile up and the irony was that the Creta who braked suddenly causing this tragedy fled away. There was a Grand i10, then a Santro, then a Beat, Myself and a Fortuner behind me. Luckily for me, rear was just a minor dent in the bumper and am thankful to the Fortuner.
Impact to myself and the passengers was very minimal and so I thought it was just a minor fender bender. Boy I was proved wrong when I stepped down and saw the impact. Bonnet, Grill and the Bumper was severely damaged. Though the tensions were high, all 5 drivers were sensible, agreed to claim our own insurances, shared our numbers and left the scene. Apart from the change in the bonnet line, there was no impact to the ride whatsoever. Drove the last 100kms and reached back home and just called it a day.
Here is the parting Pic of our trip few hours before the incident. Look how majestic she is.
This is right after the Incident.
Today (16th July) left the car in the service centre and on the way back home was trying to munch through what happened and here are my 5 key takeaways about the Scorpio-N from the Crash.
Positives:
- It is indeed a very safe car to be in – Passengers and myself hardly felt any jolt or shock during of after the incident. Maybe it is because of the high seating and the massive bonnet. The car absorbed the impact wonderfully.
- Braking is good and to the point – Though the braking couldn’t save the crash, truth be told it was less than 5 meters with the car in front. Car though couldn’t come to total rest, drastically brought down the speeds from 50’s to around 20’s in split second. Could feel the ABS kicking in and halting. If not for the braking, impact would have been much higher.
- Intercooler and Radiator are well protected within the chassis – While the other impacted cars were leaking fluids, there was no drama with the Scorpio-N. Only then I realised that the impact is taken solely by the bumper which is backed by the front chassis. Car was completely drivable for a medium impact incident like this. But this characteristic also has a downside (point 5)
- Headlight placement is appropriate and crash friendly - With the whole world radically moving headlights down to the bumpers, I personally like the conservative design of keeping the headlights higher near the bonnet lines. This in my opinion has saved the headlights assembly in this crash.
Negatives: - Design is not crash friendly – As I said earlier in point 3, vehicle chassis becomes the crash structure. The drawback of this design is that, even in a minor to medium impact crashes like these, chassis takes a considerable impact. Ideally there should have been a subframe assembly or a crash member attached to chassis that can be easily replaced in case of the inevitable. My heart today sank when the SA said that there is a possibility that chassis has to be replaced for a minor fender bender in just a 1-year-old car. He also showed me a reference of the work done for a similar impact crash and below is the scrapped chassis (circled is the dented front part of the chassis).
I challenged the SA that the chassis should be repaired but he bluntly kept saying this is their SOP and if the dimension of the impacted chassis breaches the threshold, there is only one way to go which is replacing of entire chassis. Detailed investigation is pending and I am still keeping my fingers crossed hoping for a fix rather than the chassis replacement. Kindly do assist and guide me how to proceed further.
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