Pam's not seeing these as they're strictly Aussie born and raised...

Shit, ain't ~70 tires enough?

He also has a scissors jack and lug wrench. :lol:

All ya need is a can o' air...

I suppose that I shouldn't be surprised that this still happens but I raised an eyebrow at the time taken before the driver decided to stop.

Perhaps that's an unfair criticism as people don't all behave in the same way in an emergency.

It happens everywhere, some places repeatedly, but this guy apparently took awhile to figure out what happened. He felt a small jerk and heard a noise and probably looked at his engine gages instead of the mirrors.

Blackthorn railway bridge just outside Bicester on the Aylesbury side has been repeatedly struck by overheight vehicles despite all manner of warning signs starting several miles away and on the bridge itself.

I was once following a large vehicle carrying a detachable container used for transporting scrap metal.
As it approached the bridge the driver slowed to a snail's pace and all seemed well until the truck was all but entirely beneath the bridge. That's when the fun started.
On the top rear corner of the container was a triangular steel fillet welded to a piece of vertical pipe, which I understand is to facilitate stacking of containers.
As the truck inched forward the fillet came into contact with the outside lower edge of the bridge and gradually the whole ensemble was pressed down on the springs.
Unfortunately, as it moved forward the fillet and pipe structure instantly rose and it became stuck in the corrugated underside of the bridge deck.
I don't know how it was removed but, if pressed, I'd say that deflation of tyres probably featured quite prominently in the recovery plan!

"truck hits bridge" ?

"About 23,300,000 results (0.42 seconds)"

Images galore, in 30 different categories of truck hits bridge.

truck hits bridge Video

The 11Foot8 bridge is represented on a bunch of Youtubes.
Have to admit a minor addiction.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USu8vT_tfdw

A national standard was created in the early 1950s: 14 feet. Any bridge that does not meet that standard should have been removed or fixed long ago.

Nobody should be expected to always see a sign (ie 11'8"). A human who is reading is not (cannot) see moving traffic. Expecting a human to constantly shift from and to 'text processing' creates fatigue. And does not always happen.

At a minimum, a 14 foot pole over the road with many chains hanging from that pole should be installed on approaches to and on both sides of that bridge. Then the obvious noise of chains warns a driver of a defectively installed and maintained bridge.

Rather than blame persons and reason for that defect, we blame a driver for doing what drivers cannot do every time. No driver is expected to see those text numbers every time. So many videos demonstrate the problem - that bridge and the problem people who will not fix it.

Some bridges are located over a low spot in the road. So a long trailer that is only 11' 4" high can still strike an 11' 8" bridge. Is that a driver's fault that the sign is also wrong? No. That is a bridge that should have been at 14' - generations ago.

14 foot for interstate highways only. That was for missile carriers clearance. Then they raised it to 16 feet but backed off when they found what it would cost to retrofit the whole system.

There was never any intention to make everything 14 feet. That would bankrupt the country. On the low bridges commonly hit they have tried warning boards hanging low, flashing lights, and signs up the wazoo, with little effect. You can't prevent stupid.

Nonsense. A bridge is simply jacked up and the roadway (that gets replaced every 10 years) is adjusted. It was recently done in one town so that fire engines could get to the other side of town. It cost very little to hydraulically raise the bridge and pour reinforced concrete on the existing supporting walls.

Anytime a bridge gets rebuilt - it is automatically raised. But we do not do that when naysaying cost controllers cry it costs too much and has no puirpose. After all, the destructive of trucks does not appear on those bean counter' spread sheets. So raising a bridge is an unnecessary expense. Using same business school reasoning that also created the Flint water crisis.

An interstate standard height is (should be) standard for all bridges. We have no problem spending more money (than the entire economy of India - $3 trillion) on lies for Mission Accomplished. Then have no money to fix the infrastructure. We would rather waste 5000 American soldiers on an obvious lie rather than fix glaring defects.

Took friends from Europe to NYC. They were shocked at how much of America is in decrepit condition. Trains were obsolete, noisy, and uncomfortable. Whole neighborhoods in disarray. Streets with shockingly poor surfaces. Wires hanging from poles all over every street. Constant grid lock on so many main highways. Even the airport and transportation from it was akin to what is expected in many third world nations.

That 11'3" bridge is simply another example of an economy so pathetic as to even lead poison its citizens in Flint MI - and many other towns where same actions by cost controllers were not reported.

Only two tunnels, built over 100 years ago by the long gone Pennsylvania railroad, are the only major connection to NYC across the Hudson River. So another bean counter (anti-America) governor quashed construction of desperately needed tunnels. And then obstructed more traffic over a bridge. It's not just bridges that are trophies to a decaying nation.

How many consider those crash videos from only one bridge acceptable? That is the definition of an American who would rather waste money on bogus wars and enrich himself rather than make America great. The people who say it costs too much - business school graduates.

11foot8.com

it has its own website. From the FAQ

Why don’t they fix it?
Depends on who “they” are and on what “fix” means.

The North Carolina Railroad Company owns the train trestle, and their concern is primarily with keeping the trains running and keeping them running safely. So their concern is mainly with reducing the impact of the truck crashes on the actual structure of the train trestle. As far as they are concerned, they solved that problem by installing the crash beam.

The city of Durham has installed “low clearance” signs on each of the 3 blocks leading up to the trestle (Gregson is a one-way road). There is a sensor that triggers an LED blackout warning sign when In overheight vehicle approaches the trestle (more info below). Several blocks ahead of the trestle the speed limit is 25 MPH. The folks from the city planning department said that they made an effort to prevent accidents.

The North Carolina Dept. of Transportation maintains the road, but not the signage. I suspect they have much bigger problems to deal with statewide than this bridge.

Can’t the road be lowered?
That would be prohibitively expensive because a sewer main runs just a few feet below the road bed. That sewer main also dates back about a hundred years and, again, at the time there were no real standards for minimum clearance for railroad underpasses.

Can’t the bridge be raised?
Here, too, the question is who would want to pay the millions of dollars to raise the tracks a couple of feet? To accomplish this, the grade of the tracks would have to changed on both sides of the trestle, probably for several miles. That would require rebuilding all trestles in Durham. And NS would have to shut down this busy track for months. I don’t think they are interested in that idea.

First it did not cost anywhere near a $million to raise that bridge two feet. I believe it was less than $100,000. And the grade need only be raised for a thousand feet in each direction. When the entire bed is upgraded (every ten years if using wooden ties or when those ties are replaced with concrete), then everything gets fixed. Since they are changing most everything anyway.

After 70 years, we cannot change because nothing can be changed? Nonsense. The entire rail bed (and bridge) is fixed when major refurbishment is done every 10 or 20 years.

Problem is too many thinking like an MBA - only this year. This problem exists because 20 and 40 years ago, a solution was not being implemented. All thinking must be in terms of decades - not months or years. (It even takes four years to design a light bulb.)

We are not thinking in terms of a solution. Because so many of us are educated in MBA concepts - where everything is only about the cost this year. And then have no problem wasting $3 trillion on Mission Accomplished - due to lies.

No reason for any bridge to be less than 14 feet - in a nation that wants to make America great. But those who use that expression only want to enrich themselves - cut costs - make more Flints.

No reason for any bridge to be that low. So many fear to fix and upgrade. Since, according to spread sheets, building something new creates an asset (good). Fixing or upgrading (or even painting) something only creates an expense (evil). Spread sheet (defeatist) logic.

So, tw, who pays for it?