Saved by his gearbox!

Other topics
Post Reply
User avatar
peterc
T289R Member
T289R Member
Posts: 2041
Joined: Wed Mar 05, 2014 9:05 am
Location: Surrey

Saved by his gearbox!

Post by peterc »

It might sound like a script for a disaster movie but this happens to be true.
In the evening of 5th January 1975 an bulk ore freighter was attempting to travel upstream on the Derwent River in Tasmania but due to a series of errors by its master it lost sufficient steerage and hit the Tasman Bridge. The resultant impact brought down the central supports and a considerable length of the road deck serving a main highway. Several cars driving over the bridge at the time drove off the edge and into the river below. Unsurprisingly several drivers lost their lives together with some of the crew on the ship.
However one lucky guy managed to see something was wrong and hit the brakes but not sufficiently early enough to prevent the front wheels from dropping over the edge. The car sat there on the edge like a scene from the Italian job. He managed to get out but had to swing round on the headrest to prevent himself from dropping into the water.
The fact that the car firmly stayed where it stopped was that it was sitting on a big flat sump of an automatic gearbox.
Following this incident the owner was convinced that had he followed his friends advice and bought a manual version of the car he would not have survived the accident.
The guy is still alive today and refuses to sell his Holden Monaro GTS as he believes it is his lucky charm.
Peter C
Post Reply