Flipped a Golf Cart

[Harold]

To be honest mate its not the golf courses fault, I wouldn't expect them to accept liability for it.

You obviously don't live in the United States. Here, you can be successfully sued for hurting someone else's _feelings_.

[kafka01]

I flipped one almost a couple weeks ago (luckily we just made 360° downhill instead of actually flipping it over) - and guess whos fault it was? Mine of course! If you go downhill into a curve it should be obv. that you have to slow down. So as other pointed out before - blame the driver, not the golf course.

[Chief Broom]

I learned a long time ago that golf carts can be very dangerous.

Primarily the problem is that most riders are very relaxed in the cart. What usually happens is that the driver does something sudden and unexpected (avoiding something on the ground, deciding at the last second to make a turn, etc.) and the passenger who isn't holding on or buckled in goes flying. On the golf course this usually isn't a problem, but on pavement you're going to get some road burn. I constantly remind my kids when riding to always sit down and to always hold on firmly to the handholds.

[laconic517]

Several Years ago A woman around here in Lansing at one of the country clubs died from crashing/flipping a golf cart while drunk. I think she was an employee, back then they allowed employees to have liquor on certain days after their shift was over. The crash put an end to that.

[ERC7.5]

don't all carts have that automatic governor when you go down-hill specifically to prevent such circumstances??

Go downhill and place the cart in neutral. FAST!! Have some guys that do that at my home course.....right along a pond. Scares the shite outta me.

Have been in a cart that has gone into a creek....I bailed. Wasn't driving either. Have also been thrown from a cart.

[shredfit]

I've seen one flip... and it was mid 20's guys mostly f@#kin' around and obviously their fault(I told the ranger what I saw). It actually landed on one of them but he got up and walked it off...

On another note, many courses and MN make you sign a waiver when renting a cart and if you flip it/run it into a pond.... ect.... You are the proud owner of a cart. And they make you pay full new price for it. This can range from $5,000-10,000 for the cart.

[ERC7.5]

Another incident that I just thought of:
A while back they were playing night golf at my course. Some tool didn't see a set of guy-wires for some telephone poles that are right by the first green.....sheared the canopy of the cart right off.
The dolt got lucky and didn't get hurt.

[Dent]

I've gotten air lots, but never really flipped.

[Lange]

Closest i've ever been was on 2 wheels, but otherwise just branch whipped many many many times.

[Harry Longshanks]

I've gotten air lots, but never really flipped.

Damn, underparnv has thrown himself out, you've gotten air.

I guess I need to ride more and walk less!

[Dent]

Damn, underparnv has thrown himself out, you've gotten air.

make sure to find a course with really bumpy fairways

[chingali]

I doubt it'd be the courses' fault either, how many other carts flipped over on the same day?

The best near accident I've had in a golf cart was whilst I was driving, I have rather large feet and one time I was in amongst about a million trees driving around looking for a ball when I managed to get my right foot stuck with the toe underneath the brake pedal so it couldn't be depressed and the heel jammed on the accelerator at full throttle. My mate saw what had happened while I was going around in circles trying to dodge trees and being the quick thinking individual that he his he grabbed the ignition key to switch it off and in his excitement snapped the key off, at which point he said something along the lines of "f*** this" and bailed out in to a bush and got covered in cuts and scratches. I eventually figured out that if I pulled the choke out it'd flood the engine most likely which it did and the thing pulled up to a stop. It then took me a few minutes to get my foot out, it really was stuck in there pretty well.

At the end of the round I was up for the cost of having the key extracted and a new one cut, I think it cost me about $50 but it was well worth the money spent as it was a bit of an experience that I'll never forget!

[Harry Longshanks]

make sure to find a course with really bumpy fairways

For my benefit, or for my lady friends?

EDIT: Nevermind. Benefits me either way.

[JessN16]

I doubt it'd be the courses' fault either, how many other carts flipped over on the same day?

LOL...that's the post of the day right there.

At my home course, the members had their own golf carts and you'd rent sheds on the property. Our first was a 1964 Harley-Davidson three-wheeler that we'd taken the governor off of. After it got too unreliable to use, my dad and I took it home and we used it to carry stuff around our property. With the governor off that thing, it would do at least 20 mph and probably closer to 30 or even more. I had a friend in it with me one day and was screwing around in our driveway and after taking a turn at full throttle, I slammed on the brakes, and here it came up on two wheels -- the center front wheel, and the left rear. I just stepped out of it onto the gravel, which of course unloaded the left side of the cart and it slammed back down on three wheels. WHAM -- with my friend in it. He had a slightly bruised tailbone for awhile. After getting rid of that one, we bought a 1974 E-Z-Go electric. When my course expanded to 18 holes, they put in a continuous cartpath on some of the holes but didn't really engineer them properly. One of the paths turned uphill, to the right, on a curve that had a negative radius. I went around that thing one day at a good speed and here comes the cart to my side. Again, I just kind of stepped out of the thing but this time, the cart kept coming. I literally caught it by the roof and set it back straight. Worst story I can tell is a guy who was working at a muni in Birmingham and they could chain their carts together and drive them like a train. He had a train of about 20 carts going and went around a curve to fast and dumped them ALL on their sides. Totalled a couple of them and skinned up the other 18. Boss was NOT happy. Jess

[daniel2852]

Didn't flip one, but the other day I drove into a bunker and the cart was on its side.

It was getting dark and thus very hard to see the course, I saw it a split second before the front wheels went in, tried to brake but didn't work and I had to climb out and grab my clubs and walk back to the clubhouse. Don't think the staff was too happy and I admit it was stupid, especially once I heard the one guy's reaction "you drove into a bunker?!"
I just hope they let me play on the course again, I will wrap up my round before the sun goes down of course and always stay on the cart path. I think that is helpful.

[kris]

drove in to a tree once and cut my finger on the steering wheel somehow but that's about it.

[BostonSully]

Sigh...

Worked on a course for years I've seen quite a bit.

1) Two old ladies drove a cart right into a brook. Literally its the only brook on the members only course and they both knew damn well exactly where it was. They both climb out un-harmed and walk right up to my friend and I who saw the disaster and demand we remove said cart from the brook. Laughing hysterically, we met with their demands and called the pro to report the damage.

2) Driving behind two coworkers as we remove debris from a wooded fairway area. The other two were in our 'suped up' dump cart, the both hoped in and the driver floored it. The passenger was lifted up out of his seat by a low lying branch that hit him and dumped him out next to the cart. He was fine, we all laughed hysterically.

3) Driving down a rainsoaked fairway I locked up the brakes and steered hard right. The cart executed a perfect 360 (did not damage the fairway... knew what I was doing somewhat), my friend being surprised by the sudden turn of events proceeded to eject himself from the cart and landed hard in a puddle of mud/rain. Once again hysterical laughter ensued.

The op's story is horrifying though... Makes me question how close some of those experiences could have been to being downright awful.

[Beachcomber]

I was playing golf a few years back in AZ... And it was me and 3 other friends playing golf.  We were on the back 9 and only had a few holes left.  Things were moving along as normal.  I remember, we hit our approach shots to the green, and then drove up to the green.  I was driving the cart.  And we get to the green side and I stop the cart - and we get out to go grab our putters - and literally like a half second after I got out of the cart - my buddy who was driving behind me slammed into the rear of our cart.

I just see him fly forward as he hits his chest on the steering wheel.  And our other buddy flys forward and hits his collar bone/chest on the support bar that runs from the passenger side dash and connects to the roof of the cart.  Both of our friends were hurt - and could barely move as they hit us going ~ 15mph+.

My buddy who was driving behind us - he was going full speed and not paying attention... And distracted as he and the passenger were looking out to the left of the cart to see where their balls were on the green and didn't realize we had stopped the cart in front of them.  So they slammed into our cart full speed.  No seat belts... Even at low speed can toss your ass around.

Thankfully both were Ok - but they couldn't finish because they were in too much pain.  The guy who was driving had a bruise on his chest that looked like a half circle - which was left from the steering wheel.  Pretty nasty looking too!