‘I thought I caught a stray round’: A Pittsburgh driver’s windshield smashed mid-drive, and it wasn’t a bullet

A Pittsburgh driver was just two days into owning his new Hyundai when something hit his windshield hard enough to make him think he had been shot at. According to The Nerd Stash, the driver said he was sprayed in the hand and face with tiny glass shards the moment his windshield shattered. “I thought I caught a stray round or something,” he recalled. The outlet identified him as Foxbatt, who shared dashcam footage of the moment and an account of it in a post on r/Roadcam.

He said he had been driving behind a black Mitsubishi in another lane when an object flew out of it and went straight at his car. He was not seriously hurt, though he said he bled lightly onto the only paper he had on hand, a Costco receipt. Once he pulled over, he found bits of glass, plastic, and a small chip near the edge of the A-pillar and window, along with a broken dashcam mount he described as shoddily installed to begin with.

Pennsylvania law has specific rules for situations like this. Under 75 Pa.C.S.A. § 4903, drivers are required to secure anything being carried in or on their vehicle, and violations that lead to property damage or injury can carry fines between $300 and $1,000.

The internet could not believe the odds of getting hit by a flying phone

Commenters on the post struggled to picture how it happened at all. “How does that even happen? I honestly can’t think of a good scenario that would have a cellphone fly out of your car and hit another vehicle!?” one person wrote. Another guessed, “I think someone was taking a picture and the wind caught the phone like a parachute.”

Others focused more on how much worse it could have gone. “Omg! So glad it didn’t do some Final Destination stuff and fly through the glass and really hurt or kill someone!” one commenter wrote, while another added, “I’ve had a freshly replaced windshield cracked by gravel, but never a phone!”

“Not terrible damage but terrible luck,” he said of the whole ordeal. Even a crack that looks minor can be costly to fix, though, since a full windshield replacement typically runs $250 to $800 depending on the vehicle, with newer cars that have built-in camera systems often landing at the higher end once recalibration is factored in. He also explained why the post carried an NSFW tag, noting that he had let out a curse that got cut off near the end of the video.

Not every dashcam-caught freak accident involves flying debris, either. A Texas driver whose truck was recently struck by lightning ended up debunking a myth about rubber tires after her husband walked away from the strike unharmed. Despite the chaos, one commenter still found something to appreciate in the footage, praising the original poster for delivering, in their words, one of the “crispest mother ****** around.”