Article

2007-04-30 -Short Attention Span Theater-

Overpass Collapses as Unleaded, Regular Gas Melts Steel

San Francisco Bay area residents faced nightmarish commutes Monday after one of the region's most traveled sections of freeway melted and collapsed following a fiery crash.
Melted. The author's as ignorant as Rosie.

An elevated section of highway that carries motorists from the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge to a number of freeways was destroyed early Sunday after heat from an overturned gasoline truck caused part of one overpass to crumple onto another.

"I've never seen anything like it," said Officer Trent Cross of the California Highway Patrol. "I'm looking at this thinking, 'Wow, no one died' _ that's amazing. It's just very fortunate."

Authorities predicted the crash would cause the worst disruption for Bay Area commuters since a 1989 earthquake damaged the Bay Bridge itself. The sight of a soaring freeway twisted into a fractured mass of steel and concrete was reminiscent of the damage from the Loma Prieta quake.

Posted by Bobby 2007-04-30 06:08|| || Front Page|| [11144 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 It must have been the BushHitlerHalberton plot to steal California oil since steel doesn't melt! CONTROLLED DEMOLITIONS!!!! THE GOVERNMENT IS BEHIND IT!!! /liberalmoonbat

Posted by DarthVader">DarthVader 2007-04-30 08:20|| 2007-04-30 08:20|| Front Page Top

#2 /Moonbat mode on
Haliburton slipped in a few Thermite charges for effect.!!
/Moonbat mode off

Posted by Woodrow Flerert4481 2007-04-30 08:33|| 2007-04-30 08:33|| Front Page Top

#3 I demand Donald Rumsfeld's resignation for this!

Posted by bigjim-ky 2007-04-30 08:41|| 2007-04-30 08:41|| Front Page Top

#4 What a mess. News footage I saw had two elevated levels collapsed onto the ground level road. I imagine for safety reasons, each level will have to be reconstructed in series, doubling the time. Maybe Frank could tell us more.

Posted by ed 2007-04-30 08:59|| 2007-04-30 08:59|| Front Page Top

#5 A case of ~~global~~ local warming.

Posted by JohnQC 2007-04-30 09:06|| 2007-04-30 09:06|| Front Page Top

#6 Ugh. I cross a bridge each day to get to work and home again; even imagining the loss of the bridge makes me queazy.

Posted by Seafarious">Seafarious 2007-04-30 09:15|| 2007-04-30 09:15|| Front Page Top

#7 I was there for the 89 quake. One of the proudest civic "we can do" moments in Bay Area history was getting the Bay Bridge reopened in about 6 weeks.
Funny how all of the impact studies, civilian utopian consensus building meetings go right out the window when a large chunk of moonbats, (as well as some of the more conservative people I know) can't get across the Bay.
This scenario, BTW, would be palyed out in 10 or more locations when the big one "wakes up". Sure hope we have those pollution free Jetson cars, (with appropriate carbon offseting and cupholders standard) that run on unicorn gas ready in time for the Big One.

Posted by Capsu78 2007-04-30 10:15|| 2007-04-30 10:15|| Front Page Top

#8 Quick - alter the unicorn diet, before their gas causes global warning!!!

Posted by trailing wife 2007-04-30 10:40|| 2007-04-30 10:40|| Front Page Top

#9 #6. I know how you feel, Sea. About 20 years ago I ran some tests at March AFB, but the nearest hotel available was in San Bernadino. After being told that the I10/I215 interchange was built on a fault line, the commute became more interesting. I always looked around to see if anything was shaking before driving up on the overpass.

Posted by GK 2007-04-30 12:39|| 2007-04-30 12:39|| Front Page Top

#10 "Bush lied while drivers died." Oh, no one died. O.K.: "Bush lied while the highway fried." O.K. well somehow it's Bush's fault--he didn't sign the Kyoto treaty???

Posted by JohnQC 2007-04-30 13:05|| 2007-04-30 13:05|| Front Page Top

#11 It's mornings liek today (and the next week or so) that I thank God I don't have to commute to the Bay Area. I wonder who is responsible for this:
a) Neocons
b) Bushitler
c) Haliburton
d) A low-bar selection process for truck drivers

Posted by Cyber Sarge 2007-04-30 13:11|| 2007-04-30 13:11|| Front Page Top

#12 Much as I detest the nanny state mentality, I'd say that this incident proves the need for speed governors and "black boxes" on all bulk petroleum transport carriers. There has already been speculation that the driver was speeding. While my suggestion won't prevent all cases of unsafe driving, at least the black box will record those events so that the driver can be disqualified from future trucking jobs. This incident carries HUGE hidden costs (i.e., lost productivity, expanded commute times, unnecessary gasoline consumption, increased surface street wear, excess auto emissions, etc.), that will push damages well above one billion dollars.

I'll give the Governator due credit. He decreed all mass transit in the area (BART, ferries, AC Transit) to be free today to speed up adoption of alternative transportation. Damn good thinking coming from the Capitol house.

Posted by Zenster">Zenster 2007-04-30 15:35|| 2007-04-30 15:35|| Front Page Top

#13 Can't wait til all those Mexican truckers get up here...

Posted by tu3031 2007-04-30 15:38|| 2007-04-30 15:38|| Front Page Top

#14 Notice that all the construction was
*reinforced concrete columns
*steel built up beams on the columns holding the spans
*steel beams between columns with concrete roadway.

The fire heated up the steel beams and caused them to become plastic hinges, as the steel was exposed, unlike steel in skyscrapers, which is coated with fireproofing.

The Caldecott Tunnel going through the Berkeley hills was closed for a year or so due to a tanker fire. That one killed 7 people, IIRC. They changed the hours of tanker operations through the tunnel to the wee hours of the morning.

One can see, however, that a series of tanker fires in strategic places would be a veddy veddy bad thing. Wonder how checks on CDL applications with hazmat certifications are coming? Better than patrolling our borders, I hope. I would assume nothing, in either case.

Posted by Alaska Paul">Alaska Paul 2007-04-30 16:11|| 2007-04-30 16:11|| Front Page Top

#15 The worst is still to come. This morning, the commute into the city was not all that affected except perhaps for a few lookie-loos and maybe some people on 80 heading farther south.

This afternoon, starting at about 2pm PDT 140 thousand cars that headed across the Bay will start trying to cross in the east direction. They will be forced to already crowded surface streets in most cases for at least part of the journey home.

Bad things are going to happen - and the prediction is that tomorrow will be the worst day of all.

Posted by FOTSGreg">FOTSGreg 2007-04-30 16:21|| www.fire-on-the-suns.com]">[www.fire-on-the-suns.com] 2007-04-30 16:21|| Front Page Top

#16 they can be rebuilt concurrently, it just makes the falsework trickier, and giving adequate workspace to lift, position forms, beams, and rebar is difficult

Posted by Frank G">Frank G 2007-04-30 16:25|| 2007-04-30 16:25|| Front Page Top

#17 This location can't be more than a mile or 2 from the Nimitz collapse site in 89. My guess it is new feeders from that project that are being repaired here.

Posted by Capsu78 2007-04-30 17:40|| 2007-04-30 17:40|| Front Page Top

#18 Has anyone seen a name on the trucker? Just proved Rosie and the Truthers wrong about WTC Tower 7, though.

Posted by Danielle 2007-04-30 18:22|| 2007-04-30 18:22|| Front Page Top

#19 it just makes the falsework trickier

This reminds me very little of the time I was reviewing plans a friend had gotten drawn up for the construction of an entertainment hall in Montego Bay, Jamaica. I'll never forget the look of astonishment on his face when I asked him if he had calculated in the expense of all the plywood and 2x4s he was going to need during the concrete pour. He asked why we needed wood when this thing was going to be made out of concrete.

I had to patiently explain how forms (i.e., falsework) had to be constructed to hold the wet concrete in place while it hardened. Once I saw that he was completely ignorant of what was involved, I redrew the plan for his 60' octagon building and used waffle-plate sections cantilevered over the cinderblock walls as a floor for the ceiling's pour. This eliminated a center pole that would have blocked internal sight lines and made supports for a balcony system possible as well.

I managed to increase seating capacity, improve visibility of the stage and reduced costs at the same time. He then gave me his business plan which was composed of pure conjecture instead of financial projections. I redlined the entire document and he refused to believe it was so flawed. I told him to take it to his accountant who tossed the whole thing into his wastebasket after hitting page two.

It is simply astonishing how so many people evidently think that civil engineering must rely upon magic or supernatural forces in order to be accomplished.

Posted by Zenster">Zenster 2007-04-30 18:43|| 2007-04-30 18:43|| Front Page Top

#20 Cyber Sarge -
While 'd) A low-bar selection process for truck drivers' may be the correct answer I would not discount the possibility of some bad auto driver cutting the trucker off and causing him to suddenly swerve or hit his brakes. There are low-bar or even unlicensed drivers of all sorts of vehicles.

Posted by Glenmore">Glenmore 2007-04-30 20:21|| 2007-04-30 20:21|| Front Page Top

#21 So this is, like, what, the second time in history steel has melted?
I guess they don't make it like they used to, huh, Rosie?

Posted by tu3031 2007-04-30 22:22|| 2007-04-30 22:22|| Front Page Top

10:44 Procopius2k
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