Physics of Driving onto a Moving Car Carrier: Myth or Reality?

[rcgldr]

Mythbusters made this seem more risky than it actually is. This same stunt also done on "Fear Factor" by inexperienced contestants, the driver was blindfolded and the passenger was giving directions, to drive up a ramp onto a flatbed truck.

Well, risk is relative. Any stuntage involving multiple moving vehicles at point blank range at 40mph is risky.

True, but in the case of that Fear Factor episode (season 5, episode 18), crashing was an option (and happened quite a bit), as the cars (they went through a few) had a roll cage, and the occupants were harnassed. The actual Fear Factor sequence was a timed event where the car started along side the moving flat bed truck, had to slow down to get behind it, line up for the ramp, then accelerate to get onto the ramp and brake to re-sync speeds again and "stop" on the flat bed, all of this with a blind folded driver and passenger giving directions. IIRC, the best time was less than 20 seconds. The flat bed did seem wider than the enclosed truck used in the MythBusters episode, so there was a bit more margin for error.