A bad day turn worse... hail damage!

As some of you know, the wife and I are on a cross country trip across the US. I initially headed from California to Virginia to attend come classes and now we're headed back west.

Well, today we left Des Moines, Iowa and headed west towards Nebraska. The bad omen started when I stopped to refuel my tank and the gas station wouldn't take my debit card... strange, as I knew I had money... so I call the bank and found out that the hotel where we stayed in Virginia charged us twice... $1500 twice!! So I had a negative balance. I managed to transfer money from the savings account to remedy that and had a few nasty words with the hotel manager back in Virginia...

Then as I am driving I notice my fuel economy is bad... I mean, really bad! From Indianapolis to Des Moines I was driving at 75 mph and getting 43 mpg... now I am driving at the same 75 mph, winds are mild from the side, and I am getting 35 mpg! Wth! Then I remember I fueled it with that ethanol E10 crap fuel because it was cheaper... last time I'll do that if I can avoid it, it's all gasoline after this...

So we're headed west on I-80 and winds are picking up... a lot, then the sky in front of us turns dark, dark Magnetic Gray, it's 4 pm and everybody has their headlights on, it's like night is falling upon us. The rain starts and it just gets progressively stronger with each minute until we cannot see 30 feet in front of us! All cars on the highway are going 30 mph, with emergency flashers on and windshield wipers thrashing wildly as if on crack. Not good... Thanks to the GPS I see the next exit is 1.2 miles away so I hang on...

We get out of the highway and make a bee-line to the nearest gas station. I'm thinking hail damage already so I want to put it next to a pump, under the roof cover. As we get there we are out of luck as the gas station is packed! Trucks everywhere, twenty cars squeezed near the two pump islands, no room for us! We park in front of the convenience store, ten feet away from the doors, our car exposed to the onslaught from the sky... this is gonna suck, but I hope we only get rain. As we head out in the rain and make a dash for the store we start getting pelted with small hail stones. I hope they stay small!

Inside the store is like the end of the world is upon us, about a hundred people looking scared, watching the outside... we hear English, Spanish, even Chinese... doesn't even feel like Nebraska... no matter the language you can feel the somber mood... some people watch the weather channel, there's a tornado watch on. On of the guys working at the store mentions a tornado touched down ten minutes ago four miles from us, another man mentions a train has derailed... even a pitbull on a leash looks scared, tail between its legs, the dog knows this is not good weather. Then it starts...

Pock! Pock! Pock! The sound gets louder as the hailstones grow bigger. We are told to step away from the glass in case it shatters. Between the survivors I glance outside and see the stones on the ground, these things are big! I see some from golf ball to orange size... this is definitely not good at all! I look further out and see my one month old Prius weathering the storm, wishing I could bring it inside with me!

As soon as the hail stops people head out... we don't care about the rain and wind anymore, people just want to see the damage. I just wanted to get out of there. We are headed west and the storm is headed east, so as soon as I start driving the sooner the storm will leave us. My windshields are intact but a Neon to our right and a F-150 to our right are not so lucky, their glasses shattered... Toyota builds a tough tin box, I rekoned!

A few minutes on the highway and the sky is clear in front of us, the deadly storm casting a gloomy darkness on my rear view mirror. I'm pushing 80 mph, glad to see dry pavement ahead... Then we head into North Platte, a city, not a town, with a few businesses, restaurants and a nice supermarket. I park at the supermarket and as soon as I get out I assess the car for damage...

The roof is all pock marked, dents galore! The engine hood has some dents, the rear hatch has a dent, the gas filler door has a dent, the body has a few odd small dents elsewhere, the rear left taillight is broken... This sucks!! Argh! I immediately call my insurance, they assure me the comprehensive will cover this... I'll pay the $500 deductible and they'll have it repaired. (one good news)

I have read the other threads on hail damage and I am happy that is can be repaired, however I still have a few questions:

- How will this affect my insurance premium? Will it go p or stay the same as it was a natural event? I will call my insurance company (USAA) again tomorrow to ask, but I am curious, this is my first time ever making an insurance claim.
- The car is Spectra Blue Mica, my guess is it will be a pretty hard color to match, will they automatically paint the whole car or not? I will insist they do, but again, I am curious.
- Those of you that have had the roof and other parts replaced, how was the work afterwards? Did the car leak, have rattles, fit problems, etc?
- Any recommendations on a good quality body shop in the SF Bay area? I still have a few more days driving until I get back to North Cal, and now I'll be driving my hail damaged car... what a bummer.

I am really not looking forward to having a rental car for a few weeks, but I'll deal with it... I doubt they'll give me a rental Prius, but that would be nice... I'll have to deal with the whole claims process when I get to California, I am trying to educate myself on the whole process before it all starts.

I am feeling a bit bummed out right now, the car is 20 feet away on the motel parking lot but I don't feel like taking pictures, I'll probably get some tomorrow and share the pain...

 

Thanks everybody for the replies and all the encouragement. Yes, I'm glad I have USAA, I've been using their banking services for 8 years and they are beyond excellent. This is my first time dealing with their insurance and I am glad to hear they are just as good.

We're in Salt Lake City now (we drove straight through Wyoming yesterday) and the car is filthy, the dirt masks the dents I promise to get some pics when I wash the car, maybe today.

We're headed to Reno today, I hope Lieutenant Dangle won't pull us over and should be back in SF Bay after tomorrow, then I have to deal with the whole repair ordeal...

 

Ok, update: I took some pictures but they didn't come out that good, it's really hard to take pictures of dents on dark paint!

I took the car to Capitol Collision in San Jose, CA and they seem to be very professional. Large shop, specializes in collision repair (duh), in house paint booth, etc. They had the dent removal expert look at the car and he said he could repair some dents, and that the hood had to be replaced because it's made of aluminum. The total estimate came to $4308, including new tail light and painting the whole car. I saw the car in the paint booth the other day, and although I couldn't go in there it seemed that all body panels looked smooth, no dents left. On Wednesday I am picking it up and paying the $500 deductible. I love USAA. I didn't have to fill up any paperwork at all, that was all done between the repair shop and USAA insurance.

On a twist of things, the wife and I decided we are not going to stay in San Jose. The real estate prices here are ludicrous, they are asking that we earn 3x rent to qualify for rental on a $1200 hole in the wall 600 sqft studio. Crappy looking houses are going for $600,000 here! Is everybody in San Jose dealing drugs to afford living here? There's no way I'll afford this while going to college full time, so we're moving to Utah and I'll go to college there as I have been accepted at Utah Valley University. Also San Jose State University's aviation program is going down in quality and the Governator has cut education spending in California, so we're headed to Utah. Rent in Provo, UT is $500 for a 2 bedroom apartment and they only require 2x income. I can afford that. UVU is getting pumped full of money and their aviation program is one of their most important programs. So, as soon as I pick up my Prius we will be loading it on a U-Haul trailer and will do the three day drive east to Utah and set up our lives there.

 

I believe that on most situations, close to 100% of the time, driving with them on is dangerous. And I know it is illegal. But on that day on the highway in Nebraska, when it went from 3 pm bright to 9 pm dark in a matter of a few minutes, and the rain was so hard that visibility was a little over a few hundred feet I believed I need all I had to make my car visible, so I put the flashers on. The last thing I needed was some speeding moron to rear end me and then say he didn't see me. I mitigated the risk of driving by breaking the law, but so what, the safety of my family is more important than some minor law, it's not like I killed someone.