r/Cartalk • u/raisedgrooves r/Cartalk Moderator • Feb 21 '22
Mod Post We have a problem. Let's talk about suffocation in vehicles.
I shouldn't even have to be addressing this, but we have a problem. It seems someone is intent on using this subreddit to spread propaganda about suffocating in vehicles with the windows rolled up. They have been creating multiple accounts to make posts and puppet accounts to prop up their arguments in the comments. They have been persistent over multiple weeks, and continue to make multiple attempts to push their point. It looks like Reddit is suspending their accounts, but they continue to post about it with new accounts. You can help by reporting these posts immediately.
It reminds me of the "Korean fan death" myth, where many believe that you can suffocate in a closed room if you leave a fan running. For this reason many fans in Korea have timers on them, so you can't leave them on all the time. The myth is untrue, but still, many believe it.
So, lets talk about this. I've created a poll, and am going to leave the comments open for discussion on the topic.
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u/Bggnslngr Feb 21 '22
God damn, I sure hope the 7 people that voted yes were trolling!!
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u/blumptrump Feb 21 '22
I voted yes but I'm drunk and thought the words where mixed around. Im actually not brain dead
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u/whaletacochamp Feb 21 '22
Up to 33 idiots now
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u/Littomaos Feb 21 '22
I'm one of the idiots but glad I learned something today. All the points shared in the post are ones I have never thought about it but make complete sense
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u/whaletacochamp Feb 21 '22
Hey when I was a kid I laughed my ass off at my sister for saying my moms car needed a battery. Some things you just don’t know till ya learn
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u/Longjumping-Big-311 Feb 21 '22
Maybe his exhaust is giving him carbon monoxide poisoning . That would be the only way .
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u/Desipio57 Feb 21 '22
Maybe I had some shitty cars in my youth, but my mind went to cars I used to drive where I could smell the leaking exhaust coming up through the rusted out floorboards.
You didn't want to park and idle.
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u/HerLegz Feb 21 '22
There are a many ways, but all extreme and not typical of any ordinary situation.
very long tunnel ventilation could fail, asphyxiating those in the tunnel and any who happen to be in their car.
Someone trapped in a car sinking in a lake, stream, ocean, etc.
In extreme heat or surrounded by a burning forest or flames, the air can be so thin, one would lose consciousness
The question wording is terrible and assumes much. It should clarify not in extreme situations that over ride the fact it's a car with it's windows up and the external conditions are the cause of a fatality.
A panic attack caused by claustrophobia would be another extreme
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u/Choastistoast Feb 21 '22
It's pretty simple. A Car is not air tight. Has vents at the rear. The fresh air door is generally open and even if its not a vehicle will open it periodically to cycle air in.
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u/ccarr313 Feb 21 '22
Hell, I drill out extra drain holes in the low spots of my cars trunk.
Edit - for water not air, but hey, I'll take it!
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u/OS420B Feb 21 '22
If it was airtight, youd have a hell of a time opening and closing doors, but you can make it airtight in one simple motion.. drive it into the ocean.
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u/raisedgrooves r/Cartalk Moderator Feb 21 '22
If the car was air tight no water would get in if you drove into the ocean. Since this isn't true, and all cars would take water on if submerged, it's easy to determine that there is an exchange of air happening in a vehicle all the time.
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u/evilpumpkin Feb 21 '22
Submersing a car in water leads to much higher pressure on the seals than they usually get in air.
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u/curvebombr Feb 21 '22
If the automotive subreddits have taught me anything, its that 99% of redditors don't have a clue and use their vehicles strictly as appliances. That should tell you all you need to know.
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u/turbo2thousand406 Feb 21 '22
I was working very long hours in the oilfield and there was a lot of driving involved. I was too tired to drive anymore and was in the middle of no where in North Dakota. I found a place to pull over to sleep. It was winter so I left my truck running to stay warm.
I was woke up by a knock on my window. I rolled it down and a woman wanted to know if I was alright. I told her I was too tired to drive so I was napping. She kept telling me I was going to kill myself because the vehicle was running. There was no snow to block exhaust or anything. She insisted I was attempting suicide. I told her to leave me alone.
There was no cell service there so she left. A bit later a highway patrol pulls up and said it was reported I was committing suicide on the side of the road. I explained the situation and it took a lot of convincing for him to leave me alone.
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u/seanb7878 Feb 21 '22
Well shit, I misread and voted incorrectly. My bad. I’m not stupid enough to think I can suffocate in a car
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u/VBTake3 Feb 22 '22
My mother believes something close to this, which is that if you sleep in a running vehicle, even if it is outdoors, you will die of carbon monoxide poisoning.
I can confirm this is also untrue, although it's still not a great idea if you think you may have a huge exhaust leak like right under the cabin, and/or don't trust your car not to overheat or run out of gas or whatever.
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u/Floko262 Feb 21 '22
I mean in a perfectly sealed room it would work eventually i guess but a car is defenitely not perfectly sealed.
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Feb 21 '22
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/raisedgrooves r/Cartalk Moderator Feb 21 '22
The mods have been removing them, then reporting the poster to Reddit for ban evasion.
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u/saltymotherfker Feb 21 '22
Well, in my car you can because i have an exhaust leak. But its not a concern because i always have the fan running
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u/degeneratetrader03 Feb 21 '22
People have definitely suffocated in their cars when they have an exhaust leak, but I assume you mean that people think that cars are airtight enough that you'd delete your air supply over time which is nonsense 😂
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u/Chunks1992 Feb 21 '22
Yeah I was thinking carbon monoxide poising too. People have died camping in their cars due to that.
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u/13chase2 Feb 21 '22
Oh I thought this was asking can you die from the heat with the windows rolled up which is definitely possible.
You can suffocate from lack of oxygen if you are trapped in a very bad snow storm and the snow piles up against your doors high enough.. although this takes multiple days and you'd have to sleep in your vehicle 24/7. I watched a documentary on a guy who was trapped in his jeep and the snow accumulated almost to the roof of the vehicle. He had to get out every day and clear the snow from around the tail pipe and around the doors. People searching on snowmobiles finally found him. I am not sure how snowmobiles ride through snow that deep though?
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u/BurgerOfLove Feb 21 '22
Hell yeah you can!
Especially when you're test driving a 64 Mustang with a new carb and the fittings ended up not being right. By the time we realized what was happening we were high as fuck on gas fumes!
Also if you are sleeing in your car carbon monoxide can kill you.... silently.
That's why there are detector alarms in campers.
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u/DaveLDog Feb 21 '22
You do realize that the scenarios you mentioned actually support the fact that a car isn't airtight right? Otherwise how would the fumes get into the passenger compartment?
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u/BurgerOfLove Feb 21 '22
Car doesn't need to be air tight. CO settles. Again, thats why there are detector alarms in RVs and campers.
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u/DaveLDog Feb 21 '22
Talk about missing the point...
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u/BurgerOfLove Feb 21 '22
CO poisoning is real.
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u/GotMyOrangeCrush Feb 21 '22
The OP is talking about with the engine off.
RVs have CO alarms because they have generators that run to produce power.
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u/BurgerOfLove Feb 21 '22
Oh geez, there would be no stoners if you could suffocate just sitting in your car lol.
There are nuances to it, if you do need to sleep in the car with the heater on, roll down opposing windows. If you pack a shit ton of people in a RV or camper to sleep, roll down the window.
If you replace the fuel system on a car, make sure it doesn't leak before driving. We were young and stupid... and the gas fumes made us keep some of stupid forever.
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u/Dappersworth Feb 21 '22
Not enough specification with the answers. With the car on or off? Vents?
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u/DaveLDog Feb 21 '22
It doesn't matter, a car is not airtight no matter it's vent configuration.
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u/jim10040 Feb 21 '22
With all the vacuum lines and cables coming from outside to the cabin, does anybody really think workers would try to make it airtight?
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u/Smol_PP_Locater Feb 21 '22
It’s not designed to be air tight so it’s not just a result of “lazy workers”. I worked in auto manufacturing at a foundry. We worked our asses off and meticulously ensure every part is good. Did you know we x-ray almost all parts to look for voids or shrink. The work that goes into every single part is amazing, so many people concentrating on each individual part. But no, there is no such design implications that a cabin is to be airtight, further do you have any idea how expensive your car would be.
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u/MRV-DUB Feb 21 '22
There are fresh air vents for the heating system, I have seen cabin air filters full of debris and mouse nests but never so full as to block all airflow. Most cars also have air flaps/doors in the trunk area to relieve the extra air pressure when closing the doors.
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u/poo_throwing_monkey Feb 21 '22
I'm assuming people that said yes were thinking more along the lines of heat illness from a car parked in the sun?
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u/ImmediateShirt6663 Feb 21 '22
It’s ridiculous but I’m waiting for someone to bring up the biodome experiment.
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u/WolfColaCompany Feb 21 '22
So you're saying we need to be growing plants in our cars to restore the oxygen right? /s
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u/ImmediateShirt6663 Feb 21 '22
No. The biodome experiment was failing because of oxygen levels. And the need for a delivery pizza lol
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u/OsteoRinzai Feb 21 '22
I can't believe this idiot is still posting in here. He has made dozens if not hundreds of accounts. It's absolutely mind-blowing how stupid some people are. There's absolutely no way you can suffocate in a car.
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u/Dpizz10134 Feb 22 '22
You can die of overheating, but cars are ventilated. But if you run an exhaust hose into the car, that’s a different story.
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Feb 22 '22
All cars have a venting system for example Gm trucks have them in the back corners behind the rear seat.
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u/ghillieweed762 Feb 22 '22
I couldn't light a lighter that's how low oxygen was in my car so I'd have to say yes you can because I almost did
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Feb 22 '22
Wouldn’t you only be able to suffocate if you were in a garage with the car running (or any enclosed space for that matter)
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u/Catzaf Feb 23 '22
I drove across country in the winter with my windows up. I'm not dead.
I'm not sure why someone would think this. Now if windows were up and the exhaust was jammed/blocked.. that might be a different story.
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u/brdhar35 Feb 21 '22
Why is this even a thing?