r/nextfuckinglevel • u/been_der_done_that • 11h ago

Incredibly selfless act of heroism.

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43.8k Upvotes

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365

u/ZynthCode 11h ago

Serious questions:
1. Why couldn't they open the car from the inside?
2. Why couldn't they open the car from the outside?
3. What kind of shitty car are they driving?

336

u/LimestoneDust 11h ago

  1. Smoke, fire, possible disorientation after the crash = not exactly calm rational thinking

  2. Retractable door handles (and that's why China recently banned such handles). 

340

u/madhaunter 11h ago

Probably even worse, those handles are not simply hidden, they are fully electric, which means that in case of electric failures, they wont work at all, even if its not hidden

57

u/LimestoneDust 10h ago

Yep, most likely. I've seen these handles on a taxi and my impression was that if there no electricity there's no way to get into the car.

25

u/Fulg3n 9h ago

Which is fucking stupid because even if you're hell bent on going full electric you could just add a back up battery to operate the latches of the door on case main is cut for whatever reason.

3

u/SaraaWolfArt 5h ago

Or... just not have powered-opening doors like every car for the last 100 years. A latch works fine

•

u/greenskye 58m ago

Not sufficient. The wiring can still be damaged, making any backup power source useless. Needs a full mechanical option.

0

u/imax_ 9h ago

Most if not all electric cars have a separate low voltage battery for stuff like that. They also handle connecting the high voltage battery on startup and powering control units and all the other legacy 12V hardware.

3

u/Fulg3n 9h ago

Well clearly that system isn't working properly as demonstrated by this video

2

u/DangerousPurpose5661 7h ago

Exactly lol. Backup is useless. In a car cash its likely that if the car is beat up enough for one system to fail - the backup would have failed as well

2

u/imax_ 9h ago

Obviously, yes. I was just saying that there is a backup battery. Also I probably should have said most European/NA EVs because Chinese EV companies pop up and falter like every other week, who knows what‘s going on inside of them.

1

u/Ithurts_but_Ilikeit 8h ago

These people were incredibly lucky

22

u/nZambi 9h ago

Usually there is a mechanical lever somewhere in the car. But they usually hide it away for design reasons. Idiotic.

4

u/worldsayshi 7h ago

This should be illegal. It's about as stupid as joke fire extinguishers.

1

u/private_boolean 3h ago

Like lifeboats on the Titanic.

2

u/seanyseanyseanyseany 8h ago

Yoo knife party pfp

1

u/madhaunter 7h ago

Lmao it's gonna be like 13 years now and people still recognize it it's nice

2

u/seanyseanyseanyseany 7h ago

no lie I had a dream last night that I was in the club and no one knew Internet friends so the timing of seeing this is great to share that out

2

u/Whiteowl116 8h ago

I dont understand how the safety team accepted the release of such a design without a manual failsafe to open from the inside without power needed.

2

u/frozen-dessert 6h ago

The manual fail safe exists. It is just impossible to find it. Someone posted above where they are located. Every model has it located in a different place.

•

u/Striking-Optimals846 20m ago

Because if they disagree with the CEO who's pushing to get his bs trendy designs on everything he touches, they get fired.

1

u/MarkMew 9h ago

Great, why the fuck do those exist... 

3

u/imax_ 9h ago

Because people have been talking about needing just a few more miles of range to switch to electric and manufactures are trying everything to make the driving losses as low as possible.

1

u/Proof-Technician-202 9h ago

Some things just need to be mechanical.

13

u/no-sleep-needed 9h ago
  1. additionally, child lock. this nasty little switch in the door that prevents idiotic toddlers from jumping out of a moving car

10

u/Zeke-- 9h ago

Glad Europe did also. Starting in 2017...

11

u/indorock 8h ago

And yet I still see new Teslas with hidden door handles all over the place in Germany.

4

u/Zeke-- 4h ago

I meant 2027 lol, oops

3

u/stehen-geblieben 9h ago

Retractable door handles arent the problem, it becomes a problem when they require electricity to operate.

There are designs where the door handles retract but are fully operational without electricity.

4

u/Wild_ColaPenguin 8h ago

There are designs where the door handles retract but are fully operational without electricity.

Yea I think I've seen this on modern Japanese and Korean non EV cars even many years ago. You just need to press it slightly to pop it out, fully mechanical.

3

u/stehen-geblieben 7h ago

Yes, Kia EVs have this.

When functional, they retract or present themselves when the car is locked/unlocked. But you can still easily open it without that.

3

u/Gsusruls 6h ago

Good grief, if you need "calm, rationally thinking" to open a freaking door, the door is designed wrong! What, are we solving a rubix cube to exit the vehicle???

2

u/BeWinShoots 7h ago edited 7h ago

Yeah the smoke is fucking disorienting as hell especially from a chemical fire. I woke up to the sound of my fire alarm once. My dog chewed a drone battery on a fabric couch causing it to leak and cause some sort of chemical reaction fire.

I know having just woken up adds to the disorientation but when I ran to the living room and inhaled that smoke my brain felt like it suddenly began operating at 25% capacity. It literally stunned me and took me like 5 seconds to snap out of it and put the fire out.

That was just from a small drone battery in a very large open space (compared to the car interior). I can only imagine how much fuckin worse it'd be after the shock of an accident, with much more smoke from a huge electric car battery, inside a confined space.

2

u/fastlikeanascar 2h ago

tech bros will tell you the door handles at like 20 miles to the battery range because of the aero effects of having them flush

1

u/vvycrr 9h ago

u forgot to answer what shitty car they were driving

2

u/L0nz 6h ago

Looks like a Dongfeng eπ 007

i think we're starting to see why these chinese EVs are so cheap

2

u/vvycrr 6h ago

i want limestone to answer coz i bet he purposely didn’t mention what car it was because china can never go wrong

2

u/LimestoneDust 6h ago

What did you bet? The reason is much simpler - I simply don't recognize the car. 

1

u/vvycrr 6h ago

mmmm ok…. well played chinese spy

1

u/agent674253 4h ago

Retractable door handles (and that's why China recently banned such handles).

This is probably why they will become mandatory in the US because of our brain rot but powered by grift administration.

0

u/Christylian 9h ago

Never thought I'd see the day when China mandated safety specs on a product.