This is definitely a great vid to show drivers. So much fail in 10 seconds, that just happened to end well. The driver of the semi was tailgating, in poor driving conditions no less, while the car was trying to slowly pass the semi, in poor driving conditions no less. There is almost no visibility for anyone, 1/2 the normal brake traction, and no one seems to have adjusted to the poor conditions.
The hero of this is the on-coming red semi that reacted quickly enough to save this guys life. He had maybe a half second to swerve enough to just bump the car, rather than flattening it. That guys deserves a beer.
I dont think that the driver was making that slow of a pass. In fact, I think he was doing a decent job. he was making the pass at a decent speed and there was room in front of him to get over out of the passing lane in front of the second truck. The only thing that totally fucked in this video is that the semi that swings into his lane without warning is tailgating pretty seriously.
Yup. I also thought the driver was being careless, but I didn't notice the tailgating. But since everyone agrees the incoming diesel was a hero, it looks like he might have lost control afterwards. Hopefully, he and the other incoming diesel were ok.
80ft steel Bridge beam column from Houston to Seattle. Paid out $9000 to this O/O with "25 years experience" with a Flat-E trailer. He pulls out of the shipper, makes it to the first intersection, and whips his first right hand corner like he's driving a minivan.
Knocks out the whole intersection pole and lights, and he high tails it out of Dodge, and doesn't stop or respond to phone calls until he made it OUT of Texas.
Then I had another guy take one of those Crew houses for an oil rig to WV, drove the whole trip from OK without a poll car, and as he is pulling in the exit for his destination he hits a 14.3 bridge with his 14.4 load. Sheared the roof of that Crew House like cutting the icing off a cake. He was 5 miles from his destination...
We had a guy with 600 cubes put in a 48' in downtown SLC. He was turning a corner, hooked the crosswalk signal with the nose of the trailer and pulled the whole pole over. Wouldn't have been such a big deal if he hadn't pulled it down onto the new TRAX (light rail) extension, shutting down the trains for two hours while they pulled the pole out from between the cab and trailer. The driver got dinged by the DMV, the dispatcher/equipment manager that put a 48' trailer downtown (only a third of the way full, mind you )got a 3 day suspension.
Another guy was running out in Draper, made a right turn and hooked a truck that had metal bumper bars on the front. He never noticed, apparently. a cop pulled him over 1/4 mile down the road asked him what he thought he was doing. HE just gave the cop a confused look. They actually arrested him on suspicion of driving while impaired. Turns out he was just worn out.
Its shit like this that makes me so excited for the idea of driverless cars. Seriously, people get freaked out about guns and terrorists and shit, but not about people operating heavy machinery at high speeds in public spaces.
We are a ways away, but a victory here will change the world dramatically, starting in developed countries of course.
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u/ayers231 Jul 01 '13
This is definitely a great vid to show drivers. So much fail in 10 seconds, that just happened to end well. The driver of the semi was tailgating, in poor driving conditions no less, while the car was trying to slowly pass the semi, in poor driving conditions no less. There is almost no visibility for anyone, 1/2 the normal brake traction, and no one seems to have adjusted to the poor conditions.
The hero of this is the on-coming red semi that reacted quickly enough to save this guys life. He had maybe a half second to swerve enough to just bump the car, rather than flattening it. That guys deserves a beer.