PropanePowered

And my moon roof may have saved me!

This will be a bit of a long post, but here's my story about somebody dropping something on, or throwing something at, my truck from an overpass last night.

It was just before midnight with little traffic on the road, and I was heading back from visiting some family at Cultas Lake. I had the cruise control set at 106KPH as I was travelling westbound on HWY 1 through Abbotsford, and as I passed under the McCallum Road overpass there was a massive boom, and I just about soiled my drawers!

I had no idea what it was, but it absolutely scared the living poop out of me! I pulled over as soon as I could, and while checking my rear view mirror to see if it was safe to stop, I could see that something looked odd with the glass on the driver side of the rear window.

At first I thought it was shattered, because i had read some other posts from members who had rear windows spontaneously shatter, and they had said that it sounded like a cannon going off.

It was very dark where I pulled off the road, but I could see what looked like some water had been sprayed on that side of the rear glass (I assumed at the time that it was on the outside of the glass). I then grabbed my flashlight (mental note: need to get fresh batteries because it was half dead) and stepped up on the running board to look at the roof. I could see what I again thought was water on the driver side of the moon roof, but no visible damage to the glass itself. I did a complete walk-around of the truck, but couldn't see anything else in the dark.

When I opened the rear driver side door to put the flashlight back, I now noticed what I still assumed was water sprayed all over the back seat. This had me confused. I inspected the twin panel roof from the inside, and still no signs of damage.

It had been a beautiful sunny day, but I had detailed the truck in the morning so my best guess at the time was that there was some residual water in the channels below the roof panels that it had somehow been splashed out by the impact of whatever had hit it.

At that point, I called the non-emergency police line to report the incident, and drove the 20 minutes or so home. In hindsight, I wish I had gone back to see if I could have found anything, but it would have been difficult to do so on the highway in the dark, and truth be told I was pretty rattled by the whole experience.

When I got home, I parked under the light in my driveway and climbed back up for a better look. I could now see clearly that there was an impact mark about the size of a basketball on the moon roof panel right over where my head would be while driving. I also now realized that it wasn't water on the roof as I had originally thought, but a clear, sticky substance. Upon further inspection, sure enough it was the same sticky stuff that was sprayed across the backseat and inside of the rear glass.

The first 15 minutes or so of my drive home were on back roads, so I had had the moon roof and rear slider open, and only closed them when i got on the highway about ten minutes before the incident happened.

Whatever it was, it was heavy enough and/or thrown with enough force to hit the closed moon roof, push it down far enough to create a gap, and cover the back seat and glass with remnants. My working theory is that it was some type of melon, but admittedly, I did not conduct a taste test.

I wish I had taken a photo of the outside when I got home last night, but I figured I'd wait until this morning in the light. Unfortunately the roof was covered in dew this morning, so it obscured the mark a little, but you can still see it in the photos. I also took some of the back seat area.

I got everything cleaned up, and thought that would be the end of it. Unfortunately, I was wrong. When I tried to open the moon roof during our Sunday morning Costco run, no luck! It would start to move, but then immediately stop. Looks like I'll be making an insurance claim if the required repairs are significant.

At the end of the day, I got off pretty lucky considering how this could have gone, but I would still like to get my hands on the person responsible.

I hope it was just some dumb kids that didn't grasp the the stupidity of what they were doing, and not someone that was seriously out to do harm. It wasn't very long ago on Vancouver Island that someone dropped a rock off and overpass and it went through the windshield and and killed the driver of the vehicle.

Pretty scary stuff.

FordInAFord

Wow sorry to hear man! Glad you are ok!

PropanePowered

Thanks!

Rey L.

I'll never understand people that do this. Good to read you're ok bud.

freman dave

Idiots. Glad your OK. I used to work with a beautiful young married woman in the detroit area. On her way home from work one night some idiot threw a bowling ball off of an overpass. It went directly thru her windshield instantly killing her. To compound the tragedy she was 6 months pregnant. Her husband lost his wife and child to some mindless idiot. To the best of my knowledge no one was ever caught.

GMC to Ford

The location of the impact probably saved you from any damage. The rear of the window drops down to retract so it likely dropped down on impact and sprung back up into position without shattering the roof.

My 2016 Ford Edge panoramic rear panel shattered driving down the highway and sounded like an explosion in the car. Luckily, it remained intact without shattering into pieces. The glass company who replaced it stated that Ford cut corners and did not laminate the roof glass for safety.

Fireimp141

iTrader: (1)

Some people in this world just need to be tagged for live ammo target practice. Like... we get a tag limit every year. I guarantee you I'd tag out every year.

Matt21

cant do that....have to be considerate of everyone feelings these days

Matt21

Glad to hear that you are ok. Although its been awhile since i was a young pup, but i kinda had a situation like this. I was driving over an overpass, and for some reason one of my passengers decided to throw a bottle out of the window. Luckily it didnt go over, and hit the wall. The guy wasnt thinking and was laughing after he threw it.

PropanePowered

I think you're right about the impact location.

How big of a job was it to replace the glass in the Edge? I've heard that it's a pretty major surgery to work on the twin panel roofs in the trucks, so I'm not looking forward to the dealer digging into it to see what needs repaired.