Well; Monday night my 7 months pregnant wife and 3 year old get into an 4 car end to end pile up in Westchester (35 mph road). Wife shares some blame here but she insists that she was paying attention and simply did not have time to react - it happened so fast. The damage to the car appears severe to me, I believe her story but something extraordinary had to have happened. The first car stopped for a pedestrian - apparently standing on the brakes to do so. The second car hit the first car and my wife hit that car and was then hit in the rear. Car #1 and #4 left the scene. My wife had to have the fire dept get her out of the car as she could not open her door. The police officer told her there was no 4th car but the damage to the rear says otherwise as well as my 3 year old's account of what happened. There is info on the 1st car that drove off but the 4th is unknown - wife didn't even see it.
By and large they both are fine save for a few bumps and bruises. Wife ended up in the hospital under observation for ~30 hours at that he!! hole of Harbor-UCLA. Save grace is that King/Drew is closed so we didn't end up there...
We're home though, I have the car at the auto shop and we are waiting to hear what the estimate is - I'm worried they will total it and that if they do I won't get a good value for it. It's a 2005 Prius with 40k on the odometer, KBB value appears to be around $20k which isn't quite enough to get a new one but it's pretty close. The shop was opening her up to check for engine damage (it's pretty close up in there). I know the radiator is toast though it did not appear to have leaked (amazing!). I'm concerned about the straightness of the car as I do not want a crooked car!
Anyone been through this sort of thing lately? Insurance is State Farm and I have very little bad to say about them - they have treated us very well and I have had them for nearly 20 years now, my wife has had them at least as long. I'm worried that they will also NOT total the car, I'm concerned that the air bags did not deploy - not sure they should have but from the impact I think they would have.
Here's the pic!
