Fleetwood Bounder Chassis Separation

Did that really happen? I come across more and more stories of people having accidents with their motorcoaches due, in part, to driver error. There are certainly many accidents that happen because of poor quality control but every so often a real head scratcher comes along, like this post from one of the California Highway Patrol Facebook pages.

The post reads:

What the what????
In the afternoon of 08/17/20, while traveling on US-395 near the Secret Valley Rest Area, the driver of a motorhome, for unknown reasons, allowed his vehicle to drift to the left off the roadway. The vehicle struck the hillside bordering US-395. The impact caused the entire body of the motorhome to separate from the chassis. The body of the motorhome, including the driver who was still seatbelted in the driver’s seat, tipped over on its side onto US-395. Both the body and chassis continued sliding on the roadway before finally coming to a stop in the lanes of US-395.
Amazingly, no injuries were sustained to the driver! The motorhome, however, may need a little attention….

Driver fails to pay attention and his motorcoach drifts off the road. But then how on earth does the body of the motorhome simply detach itself from the chassis?

Here is a shot of the front:

And the back:

The motorhome is a Fleetwood Bounder. It appears as though Fleetwood is aware that the motorhome can separate itself from the underlying chassis. They include this feature prominently on their website.

Bounder.

Break free from boundaries.

Stay alert and drive safe when operating these big rigs.