Bent tie-rod

I decided to go ahead and replace the inner and outer tie-rod on the driver's side today before I load up the camper and move back to Tennessee. The inner tie-rod was bent and has been gnawing my front tires pretty bad. I got the beefier Import Direct brand inner so maybe it will do better than the Amazon special that bent so easily. I know I should have put a new boot on too but budgets don't bend sometimes

 

Appreciate the pics, but this post's not gonna cut it. This is not a common occurrence. We need the story about how this tie rod got bent. How far was the jump again?

 

Funny story actually. We had a lot of people dumping trash on our property illegally. I caught one red handed. I confronted him, took photos of him doing it, and followed him when he left. He tried to ditch me by stopping at a store so I parked next door to keep an eye on him until the cops got there (I had been on the phone with them since following him.) He tried to fake me out and jumped back in his truck and peeled out of the parking lot furthest from where I parked. Well he obviously didn't know how I do it in my Tundra ! I jumped a 2ft curb and peeled out right behind him! I followed until he parked at a house so I blocked the driveway and waited for the cops. They said there was about 4 more truck-loads there he had been hauling off . We went to court and he got fined, probation, and he had to come clean up the mess