- Federal officials say the driver of a tractor-trailer that overturned and sparked a blaze underneath a major Philadelphia interstate that resulted in a collapse had failed to slow down on the exit ramp.
- The National Transportation Safety Board issued its final report in the June 2023 crash at an Interstate 95 exit ramp and “found probable cause” that the driver, who was killed, exited the highway above the posted speed limit and possible fatigue played a role.
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There were no other deaths or injuries.
Hold up. That might be the direct cause, but one driver fucking up shouldn’t cause the interstate to collapse.
It was carrying 8500 gallons of gasoline. The hatch to the tank hadn’t been secured properly and the tanker exploded when it crashed. Then the fire burned for over an hour.
Now that’s one hell of a detail for OP to leave out of the summary lol
Well that’ll leave a mark. Wonder how soon the conspiracy theorists will give it the 9/11 treatment.
Gasoline can’t melt concrete.
it was a driver of a tanker
Still true. Emergency response should be able to get there on time before tons of concrete gets weak.
There’s a ridiculous amount of energy being released all at once with a burning tanker. Bridges are of made steel and concrete, not magic!
This is precisely the reason hazardous materials are banned from being transported in tunnels. A cars worth of energy being torched? Sure. A tanker carrying several thousand cars worth of energy is a different beast altogether.
Several years ago I was unlucky enough to be stuck on I40 going thru NC when this same thing happened and wouldn’t had believed it if I hadn’t seen it - or rather seen it a few minutes after it happened.
A tanker truck of gas hit an underpass and exploded (under the bridge). It got so hot - so quickly - it melted the bridge/beams/etc.
Traffic was backed up for hours before it was rerouted (our car included) and I think it took them a year or more to get that particular intersection rebuilt.
This was my thought as well. Like, yea, this blaze caused the collapse and the blaze was the result of a tanker truck, but it feels more like shifting blame. If a fire from one accident can cause the bridge to collapse then you need to take more precautions. Stronger bridges, ristrictions of what can go under the bridge, better response times for firefighters, maybe some type of fire suppression system (if nothing else it could help even if not eliminate a fire completely), etc.
Prevention and rapid response measures would make it prohibitively expensive to manage. In this case the only injury was the driver. There was no way to prevent that once the crash was imminent. Truckers are already regulated to manage fatigue. The collapse might have actually been beneficial as they’d still likely need to completely remove and replace that section anyways. This way the rebuilding doesn’t need to account for dismantling a damaged overpass still in the air.
That there was only 1 injury and it was the driver, is luck. It’s easy to look back and think it wasn’t that bad. You have knowledge of the outcome.
Looking forward to the WTYP breakdown of what happened here, seems like a huge clusterfuck of events that had to line up for this
From Cinci to Philly, my heart goes out to you. Having a minor highway down really sucked ass.
Talk to me about 275, 75 and 74, let it sing mon frère
I really can’t trust anything the government says anymore.
Wow! No Shit!
