That reminds me of when I was a kid driving a 4200 International pulling an aluminum rock trailer. There was a "raise" lever behind the stick and a safety chain to hold it back, or "locked". A new kid didn't use his chain and the lever rattled forward with 40K lbs of 3/4" limestone and the trailer went up into dump mode. He was doing about 70 mph when he hit the overpass at LaGrange road and I-55 at 4:00 p.m. The trailer stayed and he kept going... for a few hundred feet anyway. A real "OH $HIT" moment. That dent is still there since 1985. No fatalities; until the boss got there anyway. The Fontaine 5th wheel held the trailer frame to the tractor! ws
I watched a guy hit the railroad bridge on Chestnut St. in Needham MA. back in the '70s. He was towing a backhoe with the bucket arm a bit too high. The backhoe didn't fare too well, but it left it's mark on the bridge. I was in my car in a parking lot and was not in a position to warn the driver.
My father used to work for Roadway trucking in the early 70s , and was often sent out to bridge mishaps. New drivers or new routes, driver not familiar with bridge heights on route etc often led to stuck trailers. Sometimes just letting the air out of the tires was enough to free up the trailer, sometimes not.....Jim
Damn! There had to be fatalities. We have a bridge over an expressway near us that has been hit four times recently.
