Witness: Hastings’ speeding car ‘shook my car like a freight truck going by’

[flamingdem]

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/hastings-crash-witness-113514329.html



A driver who witnessed the fiery crash that killed journalist Michael Hastings says the vehicle the 33-year-old was driving shook his car "like a freight truck" as it flew by early Tuesday morning in Los Angeles.

"Was stopped at a red light tonight when a pearl white Mercedes flew past," Michael Carter wrote on Facebook a few hours later. "It shook my car like a freight truck going by. Saw it burst into flames a quarter mile down the road when it hit a tree."
In a Facebook message to Yahoo News, Carter explained in detail what he saw:

I was stopped at the light at Santa Monica [Boulevard], headed south on Highland [Avenue]. I looked down to turn my radio down, and this car just blasted past me through the red light—it shook my car. No telling how fast the driver was going. A taxi driver was in the far right lane and we looked at each other, both saying, "What the hell was that?"... By the time the light changed, I could only see the tail lights of the white Mercedes—it was probably past Willoughby by then which was the next red light that I got stopped at. The Mercedes was flying down Highland. The same cab driver pulled up to the light at Willoughby [Avenue] and I looked over at him again in disbelief. Right as I did, the cab driver said something to the effect of, "He didn't make it." The [Mercedes] was all the way south of Melrose [Avenue] at this point.

I looked down Highland and saw a giant fireball at the base of one of the palms that line the medians on Highland. It was surreal. Even from as far away as I was, I could see how violent an impact it had been. I live in the area so parked near my place and sprinted over the the scene of the accident. As I was running, a couple of workers from the service station at the corner of Melrose and Highland were also running over. In broken English, one of them and I traded stories of what we saw as we ran. From what I could understand, he saw the car come off the ground at some point—maybe when [it] crossed Melrose.

http://l1.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/.BFst2X0CnLtQE9cdvkPIQ--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7cT04NTt3PTMxMA--/

[snooper2]

1. Maybe he should have got a Volvo instead

&nofeather=True

[flamingdem]

2. He was sick of seeing all those Volvos in Vermont!

So he went for the Mercedes.

I've met a lot of left hipsters who drive that exact car, the writers at Boing Boing come to mind.

What came to my mind was, shoot journalism makes more $ than I thought!

[cali]

6. what volvos in Vermont?

and a couple of things: he made a fair amount of money from book deals- I read he got a 500 grand advance for his first book.

Also the C-250 model that Hastings was driving has a base price of about $35,000. That's hardly stratospheric considering that the average price of a new car is almost $31,000.

[flamingdem]

7. What Volvos in Vermont?

[cali]

11. sorry, if you think that vermont is chock a block full of volvos, you'd be wrong

subarus oth.....

[flamingdem]

12. I used to live there and my family lives there

and there are loads of Volvos. Old ones too.

But yes there are more Subarus these days. Cheaper I guess.

[cali]

14. not anymore. I was just talking to my car guy up in Coventry last week

there used to be. not so much anymore- though my son just bought a 1996 sedan.

[bunnies]

16. Subarus...

The only one I ever owned was when I lived in VT. We pulled felled trees with that thing! Great car.

[reformist2]

3. Sounds like he was unconscious, or worse, before the big crack-up...

[flamingdem]

5. It sure does

Now it sounds like he went through multiple red lights.

I know that road intimately though and he went too far, Willoughby to South of Melrose on Highland for it to be a case of totally out. Sadly it sounds like totally blotto to the point of losing consciousness intermittently.

What I'm saying is that it was a half mile keeping the car going straight without a lot of wriggle room then off the road into the tree.

Also it could be a stuck pedal or misfiring brakes. If he was conscious he could have geared down though and kept the car on the road, but barely if going over 60 on a narrowed road South of Melrose.

[morningfog]

4. So sad. Sad self-destruction.

[KurtNYC]

8. Google "boston brakes" n/t

[truth2power]

9. "assassination technique" n/t

[flamingdem]

10. Is it?

The brakes are cut? Wouldn't that be noticed when first driving the car?

Or stuck acceleration?

[truth2power]

15. Google it...

Here's one link:

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Boston%20Brakes

Overriding steering and braking functions of a car by tinkering with the microchip transceiver.

Newer cars are simply rolling computers, anymore.

I don't know enough about cars to say either way on this, though.

[CTyankee]

13. this type of accident just happened yesterday early am here in New Haven.

The car went airborne. Driver and one passenger were killed, another passenger thrown from the car and remarkably not seriously injured, just a few cuts on the face.

[Mnemosyne]

17. My question is - why would he get really loaded believing someone was watching him? It seems he

would want to be extremely alert. He knew what kind of people he was up against.

[geek tragedy]

18. Substance abuse is rarely the product of considered deliberation nt

[Mnemosyne]

20. I understand that. Have there been previous reports that he had alcohol addiction? nt

[geek tragedy]

21. He was fairly open about his past struggles with booze and drugs.

I think it speaks well of him that he was so open about it, but yeah it was definitely part of his past.

[Mnemosyne]

24. Thanks geek, don't know much about him. It will be interesting to hear the toxicology report. nt

[struggle4progress]

19. I notice we haven't heard much from Sasquatch lately, which tells me

he has something to hide. After carefully watching news footage of the wreck, I can say with certainty that Sasquatch didn't wait around to watch the car burn, which is of course exactly what we would expect if he were somehow involved. So if the coroner fails to check for Sasquatch's DNA, that shows a wider conspiracy, in which case we'll need to find out whether Condoleeza Rice knows Jill Kelley, because all credible alternative theories can't be proved without exposing the Illuminati

[KoKo]

22. Wouldn't stuck accelerator cause one to go through red lights..?

Sounds like the car was out of control and he couldn't stop it in time. If he was going a hundred mph...wouldn't one zoom through red lights pretty quickly?

Those who live in that area would know the distance between the red lights to know how fast it started.

We'd need to know where he was coming from and given that everyone has GPS in cars these days and a cellphone with tracker (he could have had it turned off) would they be able to figure out when this acceleration started?

[flamingdem]

23. I'd like to know where he started out

I know the road well. Willoughby has a light as does Melrose. So that means he zipped through 2 lights according to the OP report. In that area one drives about 30 mph and is constantly stopped by red lights every 2-3 blocks.

He was coming from an area with lots of bars and clubs. But they all close at 2am as far as I know.

I'm sure that others know these details but aren't sharing them pending insurance claims, toxicology reports etc

[KoKo]

25. Yes..that's Key Info...and I'm sure it's all being checked out.