We’ve all heard about sleazeball mechanics taking customer cars on a joyride and stuffing them in a wall. In cases like that, we walk away mad at the dealership, especially if they refuse to make it right with the owner. This time, though, it’s not the shop’s fault—really, it’s no one’s. That’s because a dadgum moose broke into a BMW shop and stomped everything on its way out.
To nobody’s surprise, this happened over the weekend in Scandinavia. It was at BMW and Mini parts specialist Schmiedmann‘s location in Sweden, where the moose population is around 400,000. Seeing one isn’t so rare, then, but seeing one inside just a few feet away? That’s still terrifying.
“CEO Viktor Örtegren was at his company over the weekend to put his private speedboat into winter storage when he heard some loud noises,” Schmiedmann’s product photographer Morten Christensen told us over email. “He peeked around the corner of the speedboat, which was now inside the building, thinking a customer had come by. But just as he came around the boat, a huge moose jumped past him. Viktor was shocked and immediately hid.”
After a short stint of silence, Örtegren took another peek. That’s when the moose stammered onto its two hind legs and slammed its front legs on the hood of a freshly repainted, nearly restored BMW 850i.
The moose miraculously escaped with its life after crossing the E6/E20 highway just outside the shop’s doors. It’s a busy road, no doubt, but you can see in the footage that it re-entered the woods from which it came. Good for it.
Sweden’s unofficial mascot damaged a couple of other cars while scrambling back to nature, including an E31 850i customer car and an E36 3 Series belonging to one of Schmiedmann’s employees. It was a tough call for Örtegren to make to the E31’s owner as he apparently opened with, “I’m terribly sorry, but a big moose came by and trampled your BMW 850.” They thought it was some sort of joke but alas, it wasn’t. And there’s video to prove it. You can see the shape it was in before thanks to the first two photos here. Obviously, the rest show the damage done to the car:
Everybody is good, even if the same can’t be said of the cars. At least they can be repaired. As for us, we get a new automotive version of the famous cliche: “Like a bull in a china shop.” The sad thing is, my buddy Nico will probably cry every time he thinks of this clip.
Got a tip or question for the author? Contact them directly: caleb@thedrive.com
