Russo Steel carnage pics...

[Roadster Shop]

Originally Posted by ProTouring442

They (R&S) relied on a company who does this sort of thing to provide a secure tent. I don't know what the winds were in the area, but it is quite possible that the winds were simply too much for any reasonably secured tent of this style. Frankly, one good micro-burst may have been enough to cause the sort of damage seen here, and I am not sure any tent manufacturer or installer can really prepare for such occurrences.

We seem to forget, sometimes when Mother Nature gets pissed off, all we can do is run and hope like hell we survive.

Shiny Side Up!
Bill

There was an art fair in the same parking lot, less than 500 yards away. They had 4 good sized tents up and there was no damage what so ever. The tents were staked into the ground which was basically packed sand and dirt. After 2 days of rain the ground was extremely soft and gave way. They started trucking in concrete barriers Thursday afternoon as if they knew the tents wouldn't hold, but never got them unloaded off the semi's.

[70rs]

Originally Posted by RS-Perf

We had a few cars there. Somehow our 70 Chevelle and 70 Challenger escaped with out a scratch on them. Our '66 Chevelle and '32 roadster didn't fair so well.

The '66 Chevelle luckily only got hit on the hood. Not great, but I would still rather replace a $400 aftermarket hood than try to remove the roof from the dash!

Our '32 roadster was under the downed tent for 2 days getting beat to death. No major structural damage, but it looks like it was in a baseball sized hail storm. The tent was flapping up and down on it leaving 50 + major dents in the rear, leaving the equivalent of 80 grit scratches all over, ripped the top in 6 places, and chipped/scratched the front from all of the debris. And the windows were down from Thursday night until they let us back in Saturday morning, so the interior should have a fantastic mildew scent any day now. This car is going to be a complete re-paint and a whole lot of unnecessary work

Overall, a pretty F'd up situation.

Very sorry to hear about the damage. And while it could have been much worse and included all of your cars, it still sucks big time. I hope the roadster is in better shape then the initial inspection shows. Best of luck with the paperwork too. That alone has got to be a nightmare.

[buickfunnycar.com]

So sorry to see that damage,that '32 looks so sad...

[MarkM66]

Did the undamaged cars go through the auction? Did they sell?

How did the rest of the auction go?

[Roadster Shop]

The undamaged cars did not go through the auction. We weren't exactly in the best mood after not being able to see our cars for 2 days. So we packed them up and headed home. If we did run them through, we would have had a time slot late Sunday night, or Monday morning. It really wasn't worth sticking around for three more days to see them not sell.

The '32 is actually worse than it looks in the picture. It was wet when the pics were taken so the majority of the scratches and damage can't be seen.

Thanks for the sympathy. We still felt pretty lucky walking away with 2 untouched cars and minor damage relative to a lot of the other cars.

[E.rodz]

oh how I feel for the people that owned theese cars.I am assuming that it doesn't work like the barret jackson that the hold the title and the power of attorny paper. to bad that did not happen at barrett jackson so they could eat some bad luck. the only thing that could be good is if you had your car insured for more than it would have brought in this economy. that sucks for R.S. because it was not there fault but somehow will take a blunt part of the blame.

[ProTouring442]

Originally Posted by RS-Perf

There was an art fair in the same parking lot, less than 500 yards away. They had 4 good sized tents up and there was no damage what so ever. The tents were staked into the ground which was basically packed sand and dirt. After 2 days of rain the ground was extremely soft and gave way. They started trucking in concrete barriers Thursday afternoon as if they knew the tents wouldn't hold, but never got them unloaded off the semi's.

I am not saying that this IS the case, but, in the case of weather, it is not uncommon for a storm to do major damage at one place, and nearly no damage at another though the second is a very short distance away.

How were the tents at the art fair secured? Were they anchored with concrete barriers or were they simply staked?

In any case, I surely hope that the responsible parties do what is necessary to get these vehicles back into their pre-storm condition and the appropriate parties compensated. I know I would be quite upset of it were my project that was damaged!

Shiny Side Up!
Bill

[[email protected]]

if this happend during that real bad storm not to long ago. i wouldnt push to much blame on anyone. at those kind of winds and rain i'm surprised any tent stayed in the ground. in AZ we rarely get weather and rarely get rain and wind at that magnitude.....hell there were even tornado warnings.

[tgvettes]

There might be one big difference, the Art Fair tents have been there for quite a while so it is more like a permanent installation, they might just be built and installed way differently then the temporary tents for the Auction.

Tonny

[ProTouring442]

Originally Posted by [email protected]

if this happend during that real bad storm not to long ago. i wouldnt push to much blame on anyone. at those kind of winds and rain i'm surprised any tent stayed in the ground. in AZ we rarely get weather and rarely get rain and wind at that magnitude.....hell there were even tornado warnings.

yes, but in today's society is HAS to be somebody's fault, and SOMEBODY MUST pay for all of this, regardless of whether or not they really could have done anything different to stop the damage. <sigh>

I'm not saying that the people on this site think that way, though it's possible that some do. I just know that someone who's car was damaged in this mess, or some "lawyer" will think that way, and in the end all the rest of us will suffer for it!

Shiny Side Up!
Bill