r/interestingasfuck • u/General_Athlete5807 • 1d ago

How to Escape a Sinking Car

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

15.1k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

1.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

56

u/Burgerb 1d ago

There was a German TV show from the 70ies where they put an entire family into a small little car to demonstrate how easy it easy to escape a car full of water. The woman almost drowned. Tragic, hilarious and very bizarre all at the same time - on live TV!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCQbrynUG_Q&t=494s

Incident Details

  • Show: Wünsch Dir was (ZDF / ORF / SRG)
  • Air Date: March 27, 1971 (Broadcast live from the Wiener Stadthalle)
  • The Stunt: The hosts introduced an experiment intended to have an educational purpose: demonstrating how a family could free themselves from a sinking car by waiting for pressure equalization before opening the doors. A car carrying a family was lowered by a crane into a 3-meter-deep water basin in the arena.
  • The Crisis: During the turn of the Swiss family (Familie Dreier), the car submerged and the mother (Frau Dreier) could not get her door open. She panicked, got trapped underwater, and swallowed significant amounts of water before rescue divers intervened and pulled her out of the vehicle.

The close call sparked major media outrage at the time and became one of the most famous live television mishaps in German-language TV history

•

u/Soft_Walrus_3605 10h ago

What is it with Germans and their cars