When South Park has the big-wheel burst into flames, you can tell it's a gag to make fun of how other shows have things burst into flames that shouldn't. You don't laugh because it burst into flames, you laugh because they made fun of those other shows.
It's all in the delay between the end of the crash, and the explosion.
Closest thing I can remember to it was in Groundhog day,when the truck is laying there upside down at the bottom of the quarry, and the guy looks over and says "Maybe he's OK", and then the truck blows up, and he says "Maybe not".