Westbound Bay Bridge closed by big rig rollover
Update: All westbound lanes reopened a little after 8 pm tonight.
A Safeway truck flipped around 2:30 this afternoon after encountering the new S-curve on the Bay Bridge, leading to these pictures: a parking lot on the westbound incline, and a completely empty stretch of roadway after the site of the crash, just before the Yerba Buena Island tunnel.
Click the pix for more webcam images, of get the story and video on the KPIX website. More on the KGO TV website, including the obvious:
The driver, who suffered a bruised leg, was driving 55 mph in the 40 mph zone and did not know the speed limit had been changed. He said he had not driven over the bridge since before Labor Day and was taken by surprise by the S-curve.
I expect the prime mover’s drive suspension was air suspended.
Air suspended prime movers simply don’t like ‘S’ curves. Calculations indicate drivers must negotiate ‘S’ curves some 30% slower than if the curves were stand along curves.
Standard air suspensions have numerous inherent deficiencies. Authorities must be aware of these problems and most importantly enforce simple improvements to make them vastly safer. Improved driver education is also essential. Likewise road designers should have avoided introducing a ‘S’ curve. Most likely the curve/s possess the most adverse radius. If this is a new ‘S’ this accident won’t be the last.
[…] over the Labor Day weekend as part of the decade-long Bay Bridge earthquake retrofit project. After a big rig crashed on the curve Oct. 14, spilling cargo across four lanes, CalTrans lowered the speed limit on the curve to 35 m.p.h. and installed new signs, but evidently […]