Lady killed by flying tire

Xraywolf

Silver Member
Feb 28, 2005
3,576
4,360
MI USA
Detector(s) used
Ace 400, AT Pro, equinox 800, Simplex,Vanquish 540
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
Guess theres not much sense speculating here, obviously a catastrophic hub separation from the vehicle.
Tragic loss, RIP.

I've had some tires come flying at me, one just last week [which was caught on video cam]. Thankfully not on the freeway where there is no time to react, may not even see it coming. Had one coming at me pretty good clip about 40 mph, I'm sitting at a red light in my beautiful 68 Firebird, had my daughter in the back she was about 8 at the time. Tire separated from a vehicle coming the other way and it was meandering, I wasn't worried about death but very worried about a nasty dent in my Firebird. Couldn't really judge if I should go forward, reverse or just sit there, thing has a ratchet shifter which takes more thought and effort to shift than a typical shifter so I put it in neutral, ready to go either way with it and punch it. I waited until it got close to me as possible and I could finally tell it would pass in front of me, barring any sudden jogs, no one behind me so I backed up to give it some extra space.

Had one of my own come off, the spare under the truck. Heard a strange clinging sound then a clunk, again my daughter is with me. I looked in the rearview and saw a chunk of metal bouncing around in the street, that explains the clink but what about the clunk ? My girl says "tire !" and is looking out the passenger rear view, I couldn't see it at my angle. I said what ? She said "tire" again, pointing at the mirror. I pulled over and finally could see my spare, still in motion sorta following me. I turned around in time to see it hit a curb and spin out in the grass, remember thinking "good thing this didn't happen on the freeway".
Since then I have been checking the spare attachment periodically, which is held in place only by a cable and a metal hub [prone to rust] which keeps the tire secured to the truck, and winches down when needed. I do like having the spare stored underneath but it is a weak point with only the cable and hub constantly battling gravity holding the tire in place, I tried to come up with a failsafe setup which would keep it in place if the cable failed again, so far no luck. Anyhow, keep up on your maintenance folks, this is very likely an issue that could have been prevented. I by chance just got done with some major front end work that I probably put off too long including hub, bearings, axle shaft [1 side] ball joints, ujoints, tie rods and more, followed by a tire rotation and alignment. Just about everything was whacked out precisely due to me putting off repair [main culprit I think was the axle shaft] Threads for the castle nut were worn to the point where it would unthread and the cotter pin couldn't stop it, I just kept retightening it, putting in washers ect and I'd be back to wobbling the next day, finally got the time and $$ to get it done, did most of it myself so the cost was just parts, about $400.


[h=2]Mother, 52, is killed instantly when wheel flies off Dodge pickup truck and smashes through her windshield in freak accident while she was driving her 17-year-old son home from baseball[/h]
  • Carol Hardy was driving a white GMC with her son, Kayden, after his tournament
  • Wheel flew off a truck going in opposite direction and went through windshield
  • GMC hit another car but Kayden was only lightly injured and is now back home

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...-Dodge-truck-smashes-windshield.html#comments
 

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