So I was driving home after a nice dinner and movie evening in Orlando. My date and I decide we should put the top down and take a more scenic route home. So rather than 528 to I-95, we decide to take SR50 to 520, to US1...

Now that the backstory is set, we pick up on SR 520 just west of the Orange/Brevard county line, near the St. John's River. I was doing the speed limit (65mph) and slowly gaining on an SUV ahead of me. Once we get to a distance of about 10 car lengths behind this SUV, I see it bounce up and down quickly. At this point, it's an "OH S#!T!", hit on the brakes, then a *THUMP*, bounce, and grinding sound. So what happenned? I hit an alligator. And it was no pup. The thing was sprawled all the way across the entire lane of traffic. At least 7 feet long. And because of the sudden shock, I was only able to slow down to about 50mph.

So, we get about 50 feet down the road, and pull onto the shoulder to survey the damage. Smoke is coming up from under the car. Not a great sign. After making sure my passenger is alright, I get out and take a quick walk-around. First thing I notice is the front end isn't quite as pretty. The CF front lip is cracked all the way through in three places and is dragging on the ground. The front bumper seems to be sagging a bit, and has a nice chunk of paint missing. Being that there are no street lamps out in that neck of the woods, and the fact that I'm parked in wet sand and mud, I can't get under the car to investigate further. So I rip off most of what remains of the front lip, get back on the road, and ease it home.

I pull into the garage, and there is a very peculiar odor coming from the car, but the smoke seems to have subsided. I grab my flashlight, and take a peek. I soon learn where the smell AND the smoke come from. There is blood and chunks meat lining nearly the entire underside of the vehicle...and apparantly a nice hunk of gator flesh got caught on my exhaust and cooked itself quite nicely.

So all in all, a pretty depressing evening. And tommorrow will likely be worse, as I will be out in the blistering sun washing smelly gator meat and blood off the bottom of my car and weeping at the disfigured front end.

As for the swerve vs hit argument. Swerving quite likely would have been the costlier option, as anyone who has driven this stretch of road knows. It's a fairly narrow 2-lane highway with sand and dirt shoulders with ditches (with water) just beyond that. At 55-65mph, swerving that quickly would have likely put me in a ditch, or worse. And with a date in the car, it would have been an unacceptable risk.

Pictures of the damage and me vomiting as I'm wrist deep in half-baked gator meet will be taken and uploaded tommorrow.

 

I did the same thing a few years ago in my old beater lebaron except it was a yearling pig that fell out of a transport truck and it had been there a day or so....so it was very ripe.

Basically it exploded under my car and I had to sell the car to get rid of the smell. I pressure washed the under carriage like 15 times with no success.

Good luck...BTW exhaust cooked gator nuggets should be good eating and hopefully you got enough skin under there to make a shift boot out of it WOOOT!

 

LOL Rob sometime i think you should quit your day job and become a comedian

 

Dayummm. Sorry to hear about that Scott. Glad you and your date are okay.

Shay

 

I once hit a possum at 65-70mph and it broke the front lip, took the driver's side fender lining, and remnants of the possum melted on the exhaust. I had always heard that if you swerve to miss an animal and wreck, it's your fault; but if you hit the animal insurance views it as a no fault claim

At least you and your passanger were ok and hopefully nothing else serious is wrong as you basically hit a nice speed bump at a good speed

 

Well, I spoke to my insurance company today and as I expected, it's covered under "act of god". She agreed that hitting the alligator was probably the safest option given the few choices I had. I couldn't stand the smell, so I started cleaning under the car, but had to stop when the odor and texture of it all made me want to vomit.

Don't worry, I'm uploading the pictures real soon.

 

oh kill me now..

 

Sorry to hear about that. I hit a pack of wild dogs in Guam. You did the right think not trying to go around it. It could have been much worse.

 

Here's a preview picture.



The rest of them are here:
http://www.brevardmotorsports.org/images/s.../s2kvsgator.htm

 

OMG it wasn't a gator it was an Alien.....look all of its acid-blood dissolved a hole into your driveway!!!!

Good luck, the damage looks minor but still a PITA. I can empathize with your sour stomach from the stench!!!


Are they covering your CF Lip?