Three teenagers were killed when their car skidded off the road in southern France, went through a wall and crashed upside down in a private pool, trapping them inside.
The vehicle was a similar size to the pool and the teenagers - aged 14, 15 and 19 - were unable to open the doors and drowned.
The story notes that the pool was near in size to the car. That would mean that, regardless of water pressure, you wouldn’t be able to open the doors. My next try would be the windows but it’s possible that it was such a tight fit that they wouldn’t be able to get out the windows either.
My next option would be to pull down the back seat, exit into the trunk, and use the interior trunk release to exit the trunk. However, that also may not have worked, depending on whether the car’s weight was on the trunk (preventing you from exiting the trunk), or whether there was enough room along the back or sides of the trunk (preventing you from making your way to the surface).
My final option would be to try to kick out the windshield and exit there. I’m sure many people would try it earlier; my assumptions are that the weight of the engine would be holding the front of the car closer to the bottom of the pool; that momentum carried the front of the car close to/into the edge of the pool, limiting space to exit that way; that front airbags may make the exit awkward; and that a possibly shattered windshield and crumpled front of the car make exiting through the windshield a more dangerous route.
Other than those options, I’m not sure what you could do.
Edit: since one of my options seems to be unique, y’all should know that, since 2001,2, all US cars with trunks (excluding hatchbacks and similar) are required to have an interior trunk release that is easily visible and that has a label that ?luminesces? (is visible) for at least five minutes after exposure to light. And while that’s a US regulation and this accident took place in France, a lot of these kinds of regulations are copied across regions (it’s possible the EU has this regulation earlier, I don’t know). I found another article that said it was a Peugeot 207 which does seem to have an interior trunk release.
The article I found also said that none of the kids had a license, the youngest (a 14 year old) was driving, they had nitrous canisters in the car and, shortly before the accident, had sped past a police checkpoint.
Anyway, yeah: when you get a new car, check out how to fold down the back seats, and look for an interior trunk release. I feel so sorry for those kids, and their families :(
they finished upside down in a small swimming pool, so really no way out
I don’t think there is a trunk release inside french cars