Ever get your car stuck in the snow? It’s no fun. And getting a car unstuck from snow is often a messy, difficult affair that often doesn’t even work at all. Still, no matter how stuck your car is, having the end result of your attempts to free your car be that you get locked out of your running, in gear car, and that car is now a smoldering wreck would suggest that you’ve done everything profoundly and dramatically wrong. Like this guy did.


The Ottawa Citizen reports this 24-year old 2016 Volkswagen Jetta owner found himself stuck in a snowbank near Cantley, Quebec. Unwilling to suffer the profound indignity of calling a tow truck, the man hatched a plan, devious in its simplicity: he’d put the car in reverse, jam the accelerator down with the near-surgical application of a skateboard, and then simply guide the car out of the bank by pushing.

Once the car was free, he could just jump right in and be off, presumably to immerse himself in poutine or whatever French Canadians do when they’re cold.


Unfortunately, one thing went wrong with his plan: every fucking part. Once he jammed the throttle down, the car assumed, understandably, it was being driven, so, like almost all modern cars, it locked the doors, locking out the hapless owner.

Perhaps he actually felt lucky for a moment, because the car was still unable to free itself from the snow, its wheels just spinning in reverse, a better option than the car shooting backwards, locked, with no driver.

This luck must have been short-lived, because the car then caught on fire, with the fire burning in the engine compartment until the car finally died, and the car still as stuck as ever, only now completely fucking ruined.

From the story:

Alone and unwilling to wait for a tow truck, the man wedged a skateboard on the white compact’s accelerator, then jumped out to push, said MRC des Collines-de-l’Outaouais spokesman Martin Fournel. But the car’s doors locked when the gas pedal was pushed down. Then the car caught fire. “All while not freeing the vehicle from its unfortunate position,” police noted in a release. According to Fournel, the now-totalled car was in reverse when the engine “busted.” “I’m not sure if the wheels caught on fire from spinning or if it was just the engine turning too fast and not going anywhere, so long story short … the front end of the car caught on fire,” Fournel said.


Bang-up job, you poor Quebecois bastard!

Now, why the Jetta caught on fire is its own question. Could it be related to this fuel rail issue? Or maybe it started in the transmission, with the ATF getting really hot because of all the wheelspin and no airflow?


It’s easy – very easy – to laugh at this guy and his plight, but if I’m honest, it’s possible I might be desperate enough to the same sort of stupid shit?

Maybe.