There are cheaper ways to get your Porsche off a tow truck.
A driver in Glendale, California, demonstrated one of the alternatives when a Porsche Panamera that was already partially lifted suddenly started pulling itself forward.
The Porsche eventually won its argument with the tow truck.
Several pieces of the Porsche did not.
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The Porsche Was Already Halfway Onto The Truck
Video of the escape shows the Panamera with its rear wheels already raised off the pavement when the driver hits the accelerator.
Instead of remaining attached to the truck, the Porsche starts dragging the towing equipment forward.
Metal scrapes across the street. The Panamera keeps pulling. Then the car drops violently back onto the pavement and takes off.
Its rear bumper is not nearly as committed to the getaway.
The bumper hangs loose as the Porsche drives away, while additional pieces are left scattered behind it.
Road & Track reported that the incident happened in Glendale and identified the car as an all-wheel-drive Panamera.
That drivetrain happens to explain how this escape was even possible.
With the rear wheels lifted, the Panamera still had two driven wheels sitting on the street.
Porsche says its Panamera 4 and other AWD Panamera models use Porsche Traction Management, an active all-wheel-drive system that can distribute power between the front and rear axles.
So, yes, the Porsche’s all-wheel drive worked.
Perhaps a little too well.
The Repair Bill May Be The Best Part
The great unanswered question is why the Porsche was being towed in the first place.
A lot of people watching the video assumed it was a repossession.
Others weren’t buying that.
“Doesn’t look like a city tow truck, maybe it’s getting repo’d?” one TikTok commenter wrote.
Another argued that it could not have been a repo because somebody was still sitting in the car.
There is no confirmed answer yet, so repo jokes are staying in the comment section where they belong.
Whatever the original problem was, viewers quickly noticed that the driver’s solution appeared considerably more expensive.
One commenter summed up the apparent math as “$400 tow vs $14,444 repairs.”
Another wrote, “Probably more expensive to replace the damage than just get your car back.”
That’s hard to argue with after watching the back of the Porsche hit the pavement.
Road & Track noted that a rear bumper cover alone for a recent Panamera lists for more than $2,300 before paint, labor and whatever else was damaged during the escape.
There is no verified repair estimate, and the video does not establish the full extent of the damage.
But “more expensive than a tow” seems like a reasonable working theory.
Glendale Tow Fees Aren’t Exactly Porsche Money
It is important not to assume this was a police impound, because nobody has established that.
But Glendale’s own published towing rates at least give some perspective on the numbers involved when the city does impound a vehicle.
The City of Glendale says its police department charges a $132 vehicle-release fee for an impounded vehicle.
The city’s posted towing-company rates list towing at $151 per hour and storage at $47 for 24 hours.
Again, those figures do not tell us what this particular tow would have cost because we don’t know who ordered it or why.
They do, however, help explain why so many people watching thousands of dollars worth of Porsche parts bounce across a Glendale street immediately started doing math.
The numbers were not flattering.
At Least The All-Wheel Drive Got A Good Review
Not everybody focused on the bumper.
“Damn now I know Porsche’s all-wheel-drive system don’t play,” one commenter wrote.
Fair enough.
The tow truck had the rear wheels.
The Porsche used the other two.
Another viewer was simply impressed that the driver got away at all.
“I’ve never seen one get away before,” they wrote.
Neither had most of us.
There has been no confirmed public account yet explaining what happened after the Porsche drove off, why it was being towed or whether the driver ultimately faced any consequences.
So for now, we are left with the part the video does establish.
Somebody tried to tow a Porsche.
The Porsche escaped.
And depending on how the eventual repair estimate looks, the tow truck still may have won.