Unintentional driverless car

On Friday afternoon, our car decided to make a run for it.

We’ve had very cold weather for the past week, with temperatures occasionally reaching the dizzy heights of 0°C. Living on a hill with a very steep driveway means that at times like this we have to park on the street. The car was parked with its handbrake on and left in gear, facing down the road so that we can easily roll away when it’s time to use it again. And then this happened, as captured by our video doorbell:

The first thing we knew about it was when a neighbour appeared at the door to tell us that our car had escaped. It had come to rest in the middle of the road after hitting another neighbour’s parked car.

They have been very understanding. It’s our (car’s) fault and our insurance will cover the dent that they now have in their door. I feel very sorry for us having caused what will inevitably be admin and hassle to get the door repaired and paid for. I’m very grateful that their car was there to stop ours, and that nobody was walking up the road at the time.

We’ve lived in our house for nearly two decades and through a number of very cold winters, but have never seen anything like this happen before. I’m assuming that the tyres were warm from a recent trip, melted the ice beneath the car which then refroze and caused it to slip. But I really have no idea.

We’ve now gritted the space in front of our house and have started using the heavy rubber chocks that we usually put in front of the car wheels when it is parked on our driveway to stop it from happening again.