Have you ever left your parking brake undone (or left a manual transmission out of gear), climbed out of your vehicle, and off your car goes? It’s not common, but with over 1.2 billion cars in the world, it happens from time to time.
You may have experienced something like this if you have ever driven an automobile with a standard transmission. This is a typical scenario: you fire up the motor and then realize that you forgot something inside your house. Leaving the engine running, you start getting out of the vehicle to quickly reclaim the item.
Suddenly, you have the eerie sensation that the automobile is moving (because it is). Fortunately, you can fix this easily if you can hop back in, engage the clutch, and put the car in gear before it hits something.
A more dangerous situation is when your car waits until you are out of sight before it decides to take off. This is what happened in an unusual story we heard the other day. The auto owner parked his car in front of a friend's home on a gently descending rural road. After spending some time inside the house, he came outside and discovered—to his horror—that his vehicle was gone.
His mind started racing. Where is my car? Did someone steal it? Is this a joke? He finally found it when he assessed his surroundings and looked carefully at a large object nearby.
The car had rolled down a gradual descent that tapered off into a even, grassy yard where it came to a stop. It was difficult to identify at first because it was partially hidden by a trampoline that was balancing on top of it!
The trampoline was just tall enough to allow the small sedan to roll underneath it and take it for a short ride. It is unknown if children were bouncing on the trampoline when the driverless car moved toward them, but if so, we are sure it was an experience they will never forget. And perhaps there were anonymous pranksters involved, but they were never caught. The driver was fortunate that no one was injured and the body damage was minimal.
Hopefully, Falconer drivers reading our I-86 Truck & Auto Repair article today will always remember to set their parking brake and put manual cars in gear when parking.
By the way, thanks for visiting our site. We invite you to bring your car to I-86 Truck & Auto Repair in Falconer the next time it needs a repair or scheduled maintenance. We are enthusiastic about winning lifelong customers with our exceptional service.