Car surfing is a dangerous stunt where people ride on top of moving vehicles without protective gear. It can cause serious injuries or death, and is illegal. The trend started in the 1980s and is associated with movies and video games.
Car surfing is the extremely dangerous stunt of driving on moving vehicles. It should only be performed by a trained stuntman, but unfortunately other people do it too, and many are seriously injured or killed. Unlike normal surfing done on a surfboard in water, where falls are usually harmless enough as long as the surfer has swimming skills, this “urban” variety can be fatal after just a small slip.
Vehicle roofs are slippery and not made for surfing, like water surfboards are. Car surfing is done while standing or sitting on top of the vehicle. When seated, holding on to the sides of the roof doesn’t give the car navigator much stability. Standing, even in shoes that have a sturdy tread, usually means the person has nothing to hold on to. Crashes during car navigation have been shown to occur when the driver accelerates or brakes, as well as when cornering.
Car surfers typically do not wear helmets or protective clothing; this increases the harmful results of a slip or fall from the roof of a vehicle. People have died from slips and falls while car surfing. Others have suffered head injuries, concussions, paralysis, chronic headaches, memory problems and other medical problems. When done on public roads, car surfing is also illegal and dangerous.
The exact methods of navigating the vehicle vary, but all are considered to have a high risk of death or injury. The front seat passenger usually climbs out the window and onto the roof while the driver drives the vehicle. Some surfers increase their risk and danger by jumping from one moving vehicle to another while surfing their car. Other names for the dangerous activity of riding on top of a vehicle include urban surfing and ghost riding. Ghost riding is sometimes thought of as not actually surfing a vehicle, but rather moving just out of the car so you can still get in; however, it still proved to be dangerous and risky.
The mid-1980s is considered the starting point for the rise of vehicle surfing stunts. Many people attribute the growth to films of the time like 1985’s “Teen Wolf,” in which the main characters navigated a van. More car surfer movie stunts followed, as well as video games depicting the activity, such as in “Grand Theft Auto.” Car surfing is also associated with the San Francisco Bay Area Hyphy movement of the 1990s. Hyphy is short for hyperactive; refers to the hip-hop lifestyle, music and dance of the Bay Area.
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