Chicago Jalops may recognize this as the northernmost point of Lake Shore Drive's outer highway, where LSD meets Sheridan Road and Broadway. It's about two blocks from my house, and the sweeping curve that leads to this intersection (pictured below) is right next to the park where a theatre production I'm in (shameless plug) rehearses.
Mid rehearsal, I hear the squeal of tires and see a new-looking black Audi A8, all four wheels locked up, understeer across lanes of traffic and slam into the protective wall about 50 feet from our cast - fortunately without hitting any of the handful of other cars present. Now I've been around this corner many times, (admittedly, at 2am, sometimes breaking the low 40 MPH speed limit) and it's not tricky. It's wide. It's on camber. It's well paved. In a luxury performance car like the A8, I would imagine you could probably go 70+ around that corner without even noticing.
This A8 was not going 70.
I saw it after about a second of all four tires sliding, and it was still going at least 80 MPH (by my estimation). Seemed pretty simple - some idiot who didn't know the roads (or did, and is extra stupid) was flying down LSD, panic-braked for the turn, locked up and started to understeer, and didn't know any better than to keep the brake pedal on the floor. But, being the asshole I am, I can't let it go at that. I would never drive fast enough on a public road to put others in danger, but I autocrossed in highschool and enjoy having fun in my car whenever I can. As a car person I feel like whenever somebody fucks up a hoon, it reflects poorly on all of us. So I waited until a break in rehearsal and went over to investigate.
That's when shit got really interesting.
The first thing I notice (other than the quite wrecked A8 - right side smashed, airbags deployed, suspension askew) is two dudes in Audi button-downs. At first I'm impressed - that's a hell of a customer service effort from Audi. But oh no, dear readers, those Audi techs weren't there to work on the car...they were driving it. This was a company A8 belonging to Audi (license plate was something like AUDI 248). All I can say is I'm glad it wasn't a customer car.
I eagerly volunteered my services as an eyewitness, and immediately one of the techs halfheartedly asks me if I got "the license plate of the car". I respond "what car? Your car? It's right there". And the cop tells me the two techs were cut off. All I can manage is "uhhhhhhhhhhhh...no? They weren't. No. Absolutely not. Definitely not. Nope."
So that's how I became a witness. Unfortunately, the cop (who was very nice, but struggled with English and was far too trusting of the idiots at first) said she couldn't write them a ticket based on a spectator's testimony but that what I was saying made more sense than what they were saying (they couldn't name the make or model of the car that 'cut them off'). I told her that when she gets in contact with the owner of the car, she should feel free to give them my phone number.
...
So we'll see if I get a call from Audi in the next couple of days.
2 Audi Employees Crash While Hooning New A8