What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Amazing

[dmccarty]

Re: What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Ama

...
We consider it an IQ test for drivers...a "lab practical" if you will.

There are three major universities in the area, and if you hit the bridge, you get a scholarship to "Carolina" and blacklisted by State and Duke. :laughing:

What about Central University?

Oh PUHlese, as my Yankee coworker from Nuh York would say. Surely the drivers are ex BBall players from State! :laughing::laughing::laughing:

After all, State had a BBall player who was amphibious. That is what he said on film. What he meant to say was that he was ambidextrous.

Later,
Dan

 

[dmccarty]

Re: What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Ama

I have been to Durham many times, but I can't remember ever seeing this bridge. In retrospect, I don't want to either. Thanks for posting.

That bridge is on Gregson Street. The RR crosses at Brightleaf Square. There is another bridge a short distance away on West Chapel Hill street and and a couple of other that are just as bad. What is strange is that within a block or so there are intersections with the RR that are street level. My guess is that the bridges were done to allow traffic to pass under the RR without having to wait for trains to pass. Another WAG is that those bridge crossings might have been put it because of the tobacco factories and store houses. Brightleaf used to be a big tobacco buildings and Gregson street runs right through the complex. Some of the other low bridges are also near old tobacco complexes. Just a guess on my part.

Later,
Dan

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Re: What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Ama

Got one of those truck trapping RR bridges near me. Truckers ignore the signs. They recently spent $200K for hanging chains and more signs that get ignored. This week, a tractor trailer on that stretch of road, approaching the "truck trap" , lost control and killed 2 people in a pickup. Course the tractortrailer was not licensed to haul in this state, the driver had no log, the co-driver had falsified logs, several of the brakes were found to be non functional, and the 13'6" high truck was not going to fit under the 12'6" bridge. driver "charged with two counts of criminally negligent homicide and failure to control speed to avoid a collision" per the local paper.

 

[Mace Canute]

Re: What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Ama

A few years back a local linemen hit a wood train bridge, 2hrs before quiting time, on his retirement day! The funny thing is, the utility and RR are owned buy the same billinare.

Years ago a couple of Linemen on another crew had cleaned the digger truck off at the dump and were heading back to their service center. All was going well until they tried to drive under a railroad trestle...with the digger's boom stuck up in the air! They had raised it at the dump to give them room to work on the deck cleaning the garbage from the work sites off and they forgot to lower it back onto the boom rest. It caused a huge amount of damage to the boom, and the front of the tandem raised so high when they were stopped abruptly by the intimate meeting of the trestle and their boom that the front axle was severely bent when the front end of the truck slammed back down onto the ground!

 

[dmccarty]

Re: What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Ama

... I'm a tractor trailer driver trainer and harp this point at least 10 hours a day, if they don't get it simple as that they dont drive! Its a lot easier to explain a delay in your arrival time to your company instead of why they are buying a damaged bridge or worse yet a death! . . .John

This link is to the videos taken in Durham, NC. 11 FOOT 8 There is a comment on the website thanking the site owner for letting the videos be shown as part of a truck driver class. You might want to see if the website owner would let you use the videos.

Later,
Dan

 

[jinman]

Re: What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Ama

There was a local morning DJ in Arlington, TX who was killed on his way home on Interstate 30 near Dallas when a truck carrying a forklift didn't make it under a 14'-5" bridge. Part of the forklift boom sheared off and landed on John LaBella's car, crushing him instantly. Mr. LaBella was 51. It turns out the driver of the truck was not licensed for the type of truck/loads he was carrying and later was found guilty of criminal negligent homicide. Here's a news reprint.

D-FW radio personality killed in I-30 traffic accident

03/04/2002

By KIMBERLY DURNAN / Dallas Websites


KMEO-FM
LaBella
Memories 96.7 (KMEO) morning drive host John LaBella was killed after a tractor-trailer carrying a forklift struck the top of the Fort Worth Avenue Bridge while traveling westbound on Interstate 30 in Dallas Monday morning.

"The load was taller than the bridge," said Kenneth Shirley, assistant area engineer for the Texas Department of Transportation. "We've got signs on the bridge and on the road giving fair warning. He didn't follow the advisory."

The bridge, which is 14.5 feet tall, sustained $50,000 worth of damage including a cracked beam, which will have to be replaced, Mr. Shirley said. Inspectors were on the scene to determine if the bridge would have to be closed.

According to a statement on the Memories 96.7 website, LaBella had been a morning drive radio fixture in Dallas/Fort Worth for over 20 years. He had worked at KMEO since the station went on the air in 1998. He is survived by his wife and daughter.


WFAA-TV
LaBella's car was crushed by a forklift on I-30 at Fort Worth Avenue. The truck was in the middle lane of Interstate 30 when part of the forklift assembly caught the bridge, Dallas police Lt. John Branton said. Part of the fork assembly was ripped off and struck a vehicle heading eastbound, killing the occupant, he said.
The eastbound lanes on Interstate 30 will remain closed until the wreckage can be removed. All three westbound lanes of the interstate are now open, Mr. Shirley said.

The outside lane of the Fort Worth Avenue Bridge will be closed four to eight weeks until a steel beam is replaced, Mr. Shirley said.

 

[EE_Bota]

Re: What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Ama

What about Central University?

Oh PUHlese, as my Yankee coworker from Nuh York would say. Surely the drivers are ex BBall players from State! :laughing::laughing::laughing:

After all, State had a BBall player who was amphibious. That is what he said on film. What he meant to say was that he was ambidextrous.

Later,
Dan

That's what you ASSUME he meant to say. Naturally, if those drivers have actual athletic ability, State and Carolina will let them in (but Duke will still blacklist them.) But they better be amphibious (for a swimming scholarship) because a man that can't tell his truck won't clear is going to need to be playing with a pretty big baseball and a HUGE glove.

 

[QRTRHRS]

Re: What a bridge....Look at all the trucks & campers that shear their tops off...Ama

Karma.

A couple years back a dump truck driver forgot his bed was up and ran into an overpass in I-95, it was his first day on the job - could have been his last too :laughing:

Maybe ten-twenty years back or so, a dump truck driver did that going north on RT 512 towards Bath, PA. When his box hit the steel single track RR bridge, the bridge left go, crushing the cab and killing the hapless driver.

For me personally though, the birdge incident I will never forget happened in 1995. Got a call from my ex sister in law (who was in my corner while I was divorcing her sister) "They hit the bridge", she said! Seems, the person my ex dumped me for tried to squeeze a U-Haul under a way to low bridge....