drive axles

Any one out there ever hear of a front axle breaking. Not at the cv joints, the shaft itself snapped in half? This just happend to me on my 96 and I was curious if this was a common problem or freak accident?

Yes they do break occasionally but it is quite unusual. Most of the time they will break if the wheel gets in a bind and too much torque is applied or if the wheel is spinning at a high rate of speed and is aburptly stopped. This is not common at all however.