Photos: Insurance Auto Auctions

What ghoulish impulse keeps us going back to the Insurance Auto Auctions website? Is it the way the regimented column of front-passenger-3/4 thumbnails brings a comforting sameness to the individual tragedy of hundreds of wrecked Corvettes? Are we drawn to the challenge of trying to guess exactly how a particular car met its end? Or is it just amazement at the sheer volume of ‘Vettes in various states of decrepitude in salvage yards across the country?

Whatever the case, we occasionally run into exceptional examples of the misfortunes that can befall a Y-body on the IAA website, and this 2013 427 Convertible is right up there. With a starting MSRP of just under $76k, the 427 blends the Z06’s 505 horsepower LS7 with the joy of top-down motoring, or at least it does until/unless you set it on fire. Then, you end up with the unrecognizable hulk you see here.

There’s literally nothing that can be saved on this car; even the engine block is nothing but a very large all-aluminum paperweight, frosted with the ash and melted plastic left over from the intake manifold burning away. It might be interesting to take a band saw to it to see what the rotating assembly looks like – were the pistons, rods, and crank damaged by the raging fire as well?

At this point, the next (and final) destination for this Corvette is the shredder, but on a more upbeat note, there are dozens of less severely damaged “shelter dog” Corvettes on the IAA website just waiting to be rescued and reborn…