I didn't see this in any of the other nearby threads...apologies if it's already under discussion elsewhere...
Massive fire erupted on a section of I-580 outside in Oakland yesterday morning. Internal temp rose to some 2600°F causing much of the steel reinforcement to the freeway to melt and give way.
This will be a thorn in our side for months to come.
and also...
the tanker that crashed was delivering recently refined gasoline from Benicia (about twenty miles away) to a gas station near the Oakland Airport.
A serious reminder about how dangerous it is to have these trucks on freeways. This isn't the first time this has happened in this area either.
I am now thinking about how easy it would be to get one of these things, filled with gas, and make an intentional mess, if someone were so inclined. Much easier than getting, say, an airplane.
And another reminder of the perils of our continued addiciton to gasoline.
Please let us awake from the slumbering nightmare that is our global predicament!
A quote on this topic from the amazing Susie Bright:
It's hard for a spectacular disaster like this not to incite darker thoughts. I was disgusted to see that some of the local media were quick to remark that so far, this wasn't considered a "terrorist incident." OH FUCK OFF.
Of course this wasn't "terrorism"— this is the cost of of living in America today. Basic public services, be they schools, hospitals, freeways, food safety, etc. are all blown to smithereens because our government is so Caligula-esque in their corruption, so lax, so disdainful of what happens to "the little people," that you cannot depend on anything to work, run, or operate in a remotely reliable fashion.
mightylittle this was also posted in the news and on the Green thread, but you are totally right, it seemed like it took very little effort to screw a LOT of stuff up. It's a miracle that no one was hurt or killed.
Incidentally one of my first thoughts was "I wonder if this was intentional"....
mightylittle this was also posted in the news and on the Green thread, but you are totally right, it seemed like it took very little effort to screw a LOT of stuff up. It's a miracle that no one was hurt or killed.
Incidentally one of my first thoughts was "I wonder if this was intentional"....
WonderK - Saw it in the GTC but didn't want to hijack...this is clearly tangentially in the realm of green thoughts, but it's also about transit use and planning, and the eye of the needle we find ourselves in when it comes to alternatives in the wake of a disaster. i figured it would disrupt the flow of kind-veggie eco topics over there!
SF mayor Gavin Newsom said that this should serve as a wake-up call to the entire bay area, and the nation. this is going to be more than a small hiccup in the daily lives of tens of thousands of people...yet this is a tiny mess compared to what could obviously strike this area at any time.
BART and all other transit agencies are running free rides for today, but for how much longer remains to be seen.
I just read that the repairs , which were originally quoted at 6-8 weeks, depending on the damage to the lower roadway, are now stated at a few months minimum due to worldwide steel shortage. In the same piece I read that there is currently $10Bn in ongoing construction in SF alone.
Anyone else seeing this shortage impacting their projects? I know in my work we've seen the cost of custom fabricated steel work skyrocket...all of our fabricators are complaining about it.
something very similar just happened here in st. petersburg, florida... luckily the span didn't collapse here... in our case the truck was carrying diesel and was going too fast around the curve on an elevated off-ramp... they hit the barricades burst into flames and went over the edge to the ground about 40 feet below... it landed in the one of the city's equipment yards and destroyed about 10 pieces of equipment (street sweepers and the like)... the fire caused some major damage to the overpass keeping it closed for about a month for repair... the diesel also leaked down into the sanitary sewer system where it caught on fire causing millions of dollars in damage... luckily the only casualty was the truck driver... and a police officer that was injured by a flying manhole cover when the sewer exploded...
another minor casualty was one of my projects... a park/dog park that was planned for an area under the highway directly adjacent to where the accident occured...
wow, that one was holding 12,000 gallons of fuel. i've read different reports about the one here, between 2600 and 6000 gallons.
these guys are on the road all over the place. i always knew that, obviously, but this really kind of hit home for me...i wonder what the stats are on how many fuel tanker fires there are per year.
It is true how vulnerable we are, and I tend to think very broadly, but I feel that something like this really shows us what a predicament we are in....all of that money being spent on this war, and our infrastructure isn't being improved and we're still just as open to terrorist attacks as we were before 2001.
LB - I don't know abut that quote being "amazing." It reads like Susie is a victim because the gov't allowed this to happen somehow through corruption. This is the fault of a reckless truck driver and could happen anywhere in the world, under any gov't.
Now I'm sure there will be calls to make haz mat drivers gov't employees, similar to the TSA. Oh yeah, that'll make us safer.
i especially love how all of the reports about the incident refer to the driver as "getting out of the truck and walking down the freeway to a gas station where he hailed a cab to the hospital."
maybe he thought no one would notice the 200 foot tall ball of fire he left behind!
i did read in the chronicle today that the local officials will be looking into whether or not they can charge the guy with anything other than reckless driving.
apparently there was absolutely NOTHING left of the tanker. completely and totally incinerated.
I guess my quote out of context didn't work. The thrust of Suzie Bright's argument was that our infrastructure - both built and social - is incredibly weak and wanting, while we spend bazillions on a war no one wants, and still are open to both terrorist attacks and accidents (like this) all the time.
Apparently the same thing happened at this same interchange 12 years ago, and the engineering of the freeway wasn't changed, leaving it still as a very dangerous condition.
In Philly in 1995 there was a fire in a pile of discarded piles stored under the I-95; the heat melted that freeway and kept it closed for months as I recall. Why are discarded tires stored under a freeway?
Storing tires underneath a freeway is a different type of irresponsibility than a reckless driver at the wheel of a gasoline truck. Both however ask the same question, how secure do you want our infastructure? This reminds me of right after 9/11 when there were questions if a highrise could be built to withstand a jetliner impact. Well, maybe, but nobody would want to work in that fortress. I tend to belive life has some degree of danger and accidents can and will happen, no matter how much we spend on infastructure, or how hard we try to make everyone safe.
the I-580 connector opened a couple of days ago, well ahead of schedule. there really are contractors who can get work completed on time and, err, on budget. when there's a prize waiting for them at the end!
mad props i guess go out to the contractors who finished early; receiving a $5million bonus in the process. the state of CA also revoked the licenses for the firm whose truck crashed. they had like 40 violations.
wikipedia's current events section on the topic:
A contractor with a proven track record of rebuilding damaged freeways (most notably the Santa Monica Freeway in 1994) well ahead of schedule, C. C. Myers, Inc., submitted a winning bid of $876,075 to repair the damage to the I-580 connector.
The bid was estimated to cover only one-third of the cost of the work, but the firm counted on making up the shortfall with an incentive of $200,000 per day if the work was completed before June 27, 2007.The I-580 connector re-opened on the evening of Thursday, May 24, just before the busy Memorial Day weekend.
The deadline to finish the project was beaten by over a month, with the contractor winning a $5 million bonus for early completion. The entire reconstruction project was completed only 26 days after the original accident.
SF Freeway Accident and Collapse
I didn't see this in any of the other nearby threads...apologies if it's already under discussion elsewhere...
Massive fire erupted on a section of I-580 outside in Oakland yesterday morning. Internal temp rose to some 2600°F causing much of the steel reinforcement to the freeway to melt and give way.
This will be a thorn in our side for months to come.
and also...
the tanker that crashed was delivering recently refined gasoline from Benicia (about twenty miles away) to a gas station near the Oakland Airport.
A serious reminder about how dangerous it is to have these trucks on freeways. This isn't the first time this has happened in this area either.
I am now thinking about how easy it would be to get one of these things, filled with gas, and make an intentional mess, if someone were so inclined. Much easier than getting, say, an airplane.
And another reminder of the perils of our continued addiciton to gasoline.
Please let us awake from the slumbering nightmare that is our global predicament!
A quote on this topic from the amazing Susie Bright:
It's hard for a spectacular disaster like this not to incite darker thoughts. I was disgusted to see that some of the local media were quick to remark that so far, this wasn't considered a "terrorist incident." OH FUCK OFF.
Of course this wasn't "terrorism"— this is the cost of of living in America today. Basic public services, be they schools, hospitals, freeways, food safety, etc. are all blown to smithereens because our government is so Caligula-esque in their corruption, so lax, so disdainful of what happens to "the little people," that you cannot depend on anything to work, run, or operate in a remotely reliable fashion.
lb, what does this incident have to do with corruption? AFAIK, the truck driver was speeding and overturned
mightylittle this was also posted in the news and on the Green thread, but you are totally right, it seemed like it took very little effort to screw a LOT of stuff up. It's a miracle that no one was hurt or killed.
Incidentally one of my first thoughts was "I wonder if this was intentional"....
mightylittle this was also posted in the news and on the Green thread, but you are totally right, it seemed like it took very little effort to screw a LOT of stuff up. It's a miracle that no one was hurt or killed.
Incidentally one of my first thoughts was "I wonder if this was intentional"....
I don't know how I posted that twice. Sorry!
WonderK - Saw it in the GTC but didn't want to hijack...this is clearly tangentially in the realm of green thoughts, but it's also about transit use and planning, and the eye of the needle we find ourselves in when it comes to alternatives in the wake of a disaster. i figured it would disrupt the flow of kind-veggie eco topics over there!
SF mayor Gavin Newsom said that this should serve as a wake-up call to the entire bay area, and the nation. this is going to be more than a small hiccup in the daily lives of tens of thousands of people...yet this is a tiny mess compared to what could obviously strike this area at any time.
BART and all other transit agencies are running free rides for today, but for how much longer remains to be seen.
I just read that the repairs , which were originally quoted at 6-8 weeks, depending on the damage to the lower roadway, are now stated at a few months minimum due to worldwide steel shortage. In the same piece I read that there is currently $10Bn in ongoing construction in SF alone.
Anyone else seeing this shortage impacting their projects? I know in my work we've seen the cost of custom fabricated steel work skyrocket...all of our fabricators are complaining about it.
something very similar just happened here in st. petersburg, florida... luckily the span didn't collapse here... in our case the truck was carrying diesel and was going too fast around the curve on an elevated off-ramp... they hit the barricades burst into flames and went over the edge to the ground about 40 feet below... it landed in the one of the city's equipment yards and destroyed about 10 pieces of equipment (street sweepers and the like)... the fire caused some major damage to the overpass keeping it closed for about a month for repair... the diesel also leaked down into the sanitary sewer system where it caught on fire causing millions of dollars in damage... luckily the only casualty was the truck driver... and a police officer that was injured by a flying manhole cover when the sewer exploded...
another minor casualty was one of my projects... a park/dog park that was planned for an area under the highway directly adjacent to where the accident occured...
wow, that one was holding 12,000 gallons of fuel. i've read different reports about the one here, between 2600 and 6000 gallons.
these guys are on the road all over the place. i always knew that, obviously, but this really kind of hit home for me...i wonder what the stats are on how many fuel tanker fires there are per year.
It is true how vulnerable we are, and I tend to think very broadly, but I feel that something like this really shows us what a predicament we are in....all of that money being spent on this war, and our infrastructure isn't being improved and we're still just as open to terrorist attacks as we were before 2001.
The steel situation is perpetually nuts.
LB - I don't know abut that quote being "amazing." It reads like Susie is a victim because the gov't allowed this to happen somehow through corruption. This is the fault of a reckless truck driver and could happen anywhere in the world, under any gov't.
Now I'm sure there will be calls to make haz mat drivers gov't employees, similar to the TSA. Oh yeah, that'll make us safer.
what we need is a haz-mat drivers union. unions make everything better.
these trucks should not be speeding, period. incredibly irresponsible, this guy should be held accountable
i especially love how all of the reports about the incident refer to the driver as "getting out of the truck and walking down the freeway to a gas station where he hailed a cab to the hospital."
maybe he thought no one would notice the 200 foot tall ball of fire he left behind!
i did read in the chronicle today that the local officials will be looking into whether or not they can charge the guy with anything other than reckless driving.
apparently there was absolutely NOTHING left of the tanker. completely and totally incinerated.
and completely and totally irresponsible, too.
I guess my quote out of context didn't work. The thrust of Suzie Bright's argument was that our infrastructure - both built and social - is incredibly weak and wanting, while we spend bazillions on a war no one wants, and still are open to both terrorist attacks and accidents (like this) all the time.
Apparently the same thing happened at this same interchange 12 years ago, and the engineering of the freeway wasn't changed, leaving it still as a very dangerous condition.
In Philly in 1995 there was a fire in a pile of discarded piles stored under the I-95; the heat melted that freeway and kept it closed for months as I recall. Why are discarded tires stored under a freeway?
Storing tires underneath a freeway is a different type of irresponsibility than a reckless driver at the wheel of a gasoline truck. Both however ask the same question, how secure do you want our infastructure? This reminds me of right after 9/11 when there were questions if a highrise could be built to withstand a jetliner impact. Well, maybe, but nobody would want to work in that fortress. I tend to belive life has some degree of danger and accidents can and will happen, no matter how much we spend on infastructure, or how hard we try to make everyone safe.
just a minor bump on a regional issue.
the I-580 connector opened a couple of days ago, well ahead of schedule. there really are contractors who can get work completed on time and, err, on budget. when there's a prize waiting for them at the end!
mad props i guess go out to the contractors who finished early; receiving a $5million bonus in the process. the state of CA also revoked the licenses for the firm whose truck crashed. they had like 40 violations.
wikipedia's current events section on the topic:
A contractor with a proven track record of rebuilding damaged freeways (most notably the Santa Monica Freeway in 1994) well ahead of schedule, C. C. Myers, Inc., submitted a winning bid of $876,075 to repair the damage to the I-580 connector.
The bid was estimated to cover only one-third of the cost of the work, but the firm counted on making up the shortfall with an incentive of $200,000 per day if the work was completed before June 27, 2007.The I-580 connector re-opened on the evening of Thursday, May 24, just before the busy Memorial Day weekend.
The deadline to finish the project was beaten by over a month, with the contractor winning a $5 million bonus for early completion. The entire reconstruction project was completed only 26 days after the original accident.
now back to your regularly scheduled programming.
mightylittle, that is absolute craziness!!!!!!!!
I'm in the wrong business, obviously. Wow.
I wish someone would pay me $$$ for early completition....I usually get a 'i guess I wont be sleeping with you again'
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