Police in Michigan got an unusual view of a high-speed chase last month when a reportedly stolen Hyundai tried to evade capture in a reverse chase
The allegedly stolen Hyundai Santa Fe was spied in a BP garage in Dearborn, Michigan, on October 29, reports ABC 7. Officers attempted to approach the car, before the driver backed away and kept on reversing:
The incident happened in the middle of the day with plenty of cars on the road and witnesses who saw it all.
“He backed up... reverse all the way down,” described Hussam Aburomman, who was in his car parked nearby. “Three police were facing the other way and he was reversing, not stopping.”
The driver kept going backward as police followed, luckily avoiding collisions. Drivers passing by got out of the way and puzzled onlookers looked on.
Officers pursued the Hyundai for “roughly a mile along Ford Road,” adds Carscoops, before the driver gave up the ghost and pulled over. As soon as they stopped running in reverse, officers seized the opportunity to arrest them.
Police have not yet released the suspect’s name or said where the car was stolen from, however dash cam footage released by Dearborn officers show it was running Florida plates at the time of the backwards chase.
Attempting to outrun police in reverse is a bit like attempting to flee officers while stuck in first gear. Your car can’t get up much speed when it’s going backwards because aerodynamics aren’t working in your favor and the reverse gear in most cars isn’t up to much.
Thanks to the idler gear that sits between the input and output of your gearbox, your car is working with restricted ratios and increased friction. This limits your speed somewhat and, in manuals in particular, means your car sounds a bit weird when running in reverse.
High-speed police chases are never a good idea, usually ending in a crash involving one of the cars caught up in the chase or an incident with an innocent bystander. Slow-speed chases where a car stays in reverse gear for the whole thing, they’re a much more fun affair.