Photo: Instagram screen capture
A guy on a bike that goes by the nickname PipeBurns (our capitalization) captured the moment when a Tesla Roadster fails to negotiate a right-hand turn correctly and ends up under the front bumper of a BMW 5 Series E39.
As we all know, the first Tesla model is based on the chassis of a Lotus Elise, a super-lightweight sports car famous for its heavenly handling. We also know that adding a battery pack increases the vehicle's weight significantly. And we're all too aware as well of the fact that any car, under the right circumstances, can understeer.
Something tells us - and it's just a gut feeling that we'll never be able to prove - that the person behind the wheel of the Tesla was not its owner. It looks as though it was someone "test driving" it, probably for the first time. There's something about the way they accelerate after the crash that suggests that person did not know the car too well.
It all happens while our man waits for the traffic lights to turn green after lane splitting his way to the front. His camera sits on top of his helmet, registering his head's movements. We can see him zipping from left to right. At one point, he turns to the left just in time to see the Tesla entering the intersection, but a fast moving bike catches his attention and he follows that instead.
That means we don't get to see the exact moment of impact, but we definitely get to hear it. His reaction is strangely quite calm considering the EV was just a few feet away from crashing into him. The Tesla driver obviously did not enter the turn at the right speed, lost control and wedged the car under the BMW.
Damage on the German sedan doesn't seem to be that extensive, and we can thank cheap plastic for that. As the Roadster backed away, it did pull off the license plate, which was the perfect occasion for PipeBurns to gallantly pick it up and hand it over to the BMW driver. We don't get to see the outcome, but since the Tesla immediately pulled over, our guess is it all worked out well. Of course, the only winners in this situation are the local BMW and Tesla shops.
Something tells us - and it's just a gut feeling that we'll never be able to prove - that the person behind the wheel of the Tesla was not its owner. It looks as though it was someone "test driving" it, probably for the first time. There's something about the way they accelerate after the crash that suggests that person did not know the car too well.
It all happens while our man waits for the traffic lights to turn green after lane splitting his way to the front. His camera sits on top of his helmet, registering his head's movements. We can see him zipping from left to right. At one point, he turns to the left just in time to see the Tesla entering the intersection, but a fast moving bike catches his attention and he follows that instead.
That means we don't get to see the exact moment of impact, but we definitely get to hear it. His reaction is strangely quite calm considering the EV was just a few feet away from crashing into him. The Tesla driver obviously did not enter the turn at the right speed, lost control and wedged the car under the BMW.
Damage on the German sedan doesn't seem to be that extensive, and we can thank cheap plastic for that. As the Roadster backed away, it did pull off the license plate, which was the perfect occasion for PipeBurns to gallantly pick it up and hand it over to the BMW driver. We don't get to see the outcome, but since the Tesla immediately pulled over, our guess is it all worked out well. Of course, the only winners in this situation are the local BMW and Tesla shops.
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