Hand wash only, air dry...

Ouch indeed. That would suck sitting in the car wash as that happened with nothing you could do about it until the process finished.

I guess I'll never have to worry about anything like that with my truck. I haven't found an automated car wash yet that can take a dully!

First of all, Geico should pay back the deductible to the owner, when they recover from the carwash insurance. That's what my insurance did when the at-fault liability refused to pay and I filed on my own collision.

Second---one more reason to NEVER use a car wash with brushes. The kind that just spray the car are much better.

Freak occurrence, nothing to do with an aluminum bodied vehicle.
If it didn't rip the fender it would have ripped something else apart.
Sucks. Now I know why I take off my antenna!

Grit dog wrote:
Freak occurrence, nothing to do with an aluminum bodied vehicle.
If it didn't rip the fender it would have ripped something else apart.
Sucks. Now I know why I take off my antenna!

Freak accident for sure.
However, I highly doubt the same would have occurred with a steel body truck.

That reminds me of what the Autonation Chevy delaer in Spokane did to my truck, and didn't tell me about it. When I brought it to their attention they said "take it to our Collision Center up the road."

There's a reason they call it Collision Center!

The "collision center" trashed the dually fender on the truck because some azz-hat lot-boi didn't know how to drive a dually, and crashed it in to the side of the building pulling it in to the shop. When I discovered that repaired damaged on the bed, the entire shop staff lied about it and to this day they still deny doing it.
I forced them to install a new bed side. I told them a "repaired bed side was unacceptable"

I was going thru a brush type car wash with my Caddy when all of a sudden the right side of the car was being thrashed with an antennae from the car ahead,their insurance covered it.

Went through one of these panel beater warshes in about 1985. Ordered a new driver side mirror afterward and never been back to one since.

Took a Titan through the local car wash many times. On one occasion all the equipment was operating normally. When I went through the right side wrap (goes from the front bumper, down the passenger's side and around the back didn't retract. It went up the hood, over the top and landed on the bed cover. Of course it creased the top of the truck from the windshield to the back edge.

Made a claim through my insurance and paid the deductible. Truck got a new roof, the car wash paid the over $6,000 damage and my insurance refunded the deductible. We pay insurance for them to worry about things. The car wash wanted me to use their recommended shop, which was about 1/2 the price but I used the one I always use.

Having worked at one of these type car washes my advice is fold all the mirrors in (cars and trucks), remove the antenna and take everything out of a truck bed (it is amazing to watch tornado strength winds blow stuff out of a truck)

Sorry to hear about your incident. I use automated car washes all he time because at my age I'm not a fan of getting out a ladder to wash my truck. That being said, every car wash I have been to has a prominently displayed sign warning drivers to remove their radio antennas, all loose items, and fold in their "tow mirrors", because what happened to you is a common issue.