133 car crash in Fort Worth

DFW had some very isolated icing on the roads early Thursday morning. The Express lanes of 35W had one bad patch in a downhill area that was otherwise clear.
A total of 133 vehicles were involved in a pile up that had the road still shut down Friday morning.
There were 6 fatalities and 36 people injured at the scene. Other drivers sought medical treatment later bringing the total to more than 70 injured.

Whomever got hit by the FedEx truck just hit the lottery.

Knowing the road conditions and driving at a safe speed...what's so hard about doing that? If you are not sure about your driving skills, or your vehicle is not built/equipped for those conditions - get off the road.

Since that Fed Ex driver likely survived, if it was me, I'm not sure I would ever be able to drive a rig again being that apparently helpless ,and plowing into all those wrecked cars, at speed. I'm assuming the Fed Ex driver was no goofball , 1st day driver.

One of my wife's co-workers was driving in From Denton, she said everything was fine, no ice at all until they got to 28th street. So highway speeds all the way into ice, NOT good. She was trapped left and right, couldn't get out, finally somebody came along and got her out through the trunk.

Saw an interview with another guy, was trying to get a lady out of the car as the Fedex truck approached, didn't have enough time to get her out and she was crushed.

Rob, as a native Michigander, former Wisconsinite, Utahan and Ohioan, you don't know what you're talking about. It's different here. West Texas and the panhandle are more similar to what you're used to.

No real shock to see ..if the speed limit was 100 in Texas, they would go 110 and ride your bumper like your holding them up

That's some unsettling footage.
Those cars the FedEx truck hit were essentially a ramp; I'd be surprised if those folks survived.
Not having been there, it's hard to say what might have prevented or mitigated that, but sudden ice is obviously a nasty thing.
On non-winter tires, sailing along, and then hitting the brakes...trajectory & time are pretty much running things.
My brother said my niece would have been there except she had the day off.

The situation, at least as my wife's coworker described it, drove in from Denton, about 30 miles at normal highway speeds, no precipitation at all, it's dark and they're in the express lanes, I think the speed limit there is 75 MPH, all of a sudden you crest a bridge and you're on ice between barriers. Not a damned thing you can do. She said she aimed for the softest thing she could pick out amongst the horrible choices she had.

I have relatives in San Antonio and Houston. Folks down there can't drive in the rain. The TV and Radio news outlets were warning folks about the threat of ice for hours leading up to this crash. Poor choices. I feel bad for those who died. It could have been avoided.

let off the brakes so you can steer a little and try to ease into the guardrail is about all you can hope to do.

I saw a story earlier I can't find now, about a guy who was in the crash and then was helping people get free from their wrecked cars. There was a woman screaming in a wreck, and he was trying to help her but saw the Fed Ex semi coming towards them out of control and lept under a wrecked semi trailer and was OK but saw the woman crushed to death right in front of his eyes by the Fed Ex truck crashing into her wrecked car.
Having lived in this area my whole life I hate salt for all the damage its done to my cars, but realize it is necessary.
They do a damn good job here with pre treating, plowing and salting but every now and then there will be an icy spot and it catches you by surprise. A few years ago it was super cold but hadn't snowed in days so the streets were clear and dry. I was in a left turn lane going maybe 30 to try to make the arrow, tapped the brakes, and completely lost control in the blink of an eye, car went into the intersection spinning around and I was bracing waiting to wreck into someone or something, but the car came to a halt after a couple turns without hitting anyone thankfully. It was a busy intersection with cars stopped at all corners, I looked around sheepishly thinking of Peewee Herman in one of his movies "I meant to do that! he he" and then turned the wheel and headed on my way. I still cringe thinking of how quick I lost control, and I'm a person who has suffered through decades of driving in snowstorms and other treacherous winter conditions.

DRIVE FASTER DUMMIES!!!!



UN-faqqing believable why people have to drive so fast. I can be anywhere I need to be, and on time at sixty mile an hour, why can't anyone else?

That, and with almost every vehicle on the road having an outside temperature gauge right between your eyes it is absolutely inexcusable for something like this to happen.

Those truck drivers should have known better. Unfortunately two years ago most of them were only driving goats and camels.

Not down here...two years ago those guys were probably getting their sisters pregnant.

Now that's a voice of experience.


That Fedex truck is well wired. I'm sure they already know how fast he was going, when the brakes were applied, and how far he went after hitting the brakes.

I guarantee there was a line across that highway that had dry bare pavement on one side and glare ice on the other.

I have experienced that phenomenon in that particular part of Texas with a big truck and it is no joke. You're motoring along at 65 mph with no hint of a problem and your first clue is when you lift your foot and the drive tires lock up.

You pop over a rise in those conditions and you very suddenly find that you are now a passenger.

Kevin

I was iced in at the Wes-T-Go truck stop in Tye, TX back in 04 or 05, I think. In Abilene, about 10 miles east, the roads were basically dry. Pockets of precip are strange, but not unusual.

This is from a better day/

I made a 200 mile trip on I-75 yesterday with the temperature below freezing.
There was not a 5 minute segment of the trip where I did not see crazy behavior.
I agree that the judgement and rationality of big truck drivers has gone down a lot.

It doesn't surprise me with Fed-EX. I drive trucks in the northeast and the trucks I'm in are topped out at 65 mph. It's rare that I pass any Fed-Ex driver, in fact they seem to be the fastest guys out there, and some of them don't seem to care how they get by you. They give the rest of us a bad name.

That must've been terrifying..

I think the 0:46 to 0:50 second mark of the video tells the story:

..."Bridge Freezes Before Roadway" ...

There isn't much a driver can do once they enter an iced-over bridge at ANY speed, let alone 75, with concrete barriers on both sides...

Like Twostick already said, at that point the outcome is determined by the Laws of Physics, nothing you can do but hang on and hope.
- Art

Exactly. Speeding thru construction zones. Most of them are contractors.

I was surprised to hear that they had ice down in Texas. My next thought was they are not familiar with it so it's not surprising something like this happened. Up here in the rust belt we have been dealing with snow/ice/freezing rain for weeks now. It's relay unfortunate but i don't see how getting hit or possibly killed is like hitting the lottery.

Were you dropped on your head or something?

Yeah, that’s a lottery I have no interest in playing.

i saw that on the evening news, and the first think i thought of was : "KEEP IT UNDER A HUNDERD, DUMMAZZ !!!!!!!"

having driven the interstate to work for over 42+ years, i have seen it all, weather wise.
it NEVER fails, when it rains, snows, or is ice, it seems the IDIOTS speed up ! WHY ?????????????
i'm always looking around for a place to go, and on that road, [I-80] i pretty much could guess where the IMBECILES would "park" themselves.
absolutely NO excuse for this behavior, and over the last 20 years, it has gotten MUCH WORSE !

i'm so sorry for the families that lost loved ones in that horrific crash. IT COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED !!!!!

Out here in East Texas, you gotta watch out for the gravel hauler 18 wheelers. Those guys obviously get paid by how many loads they deliver that day. If you are sitting at a red light and it turns green, you better look both ways before going. I've seen them blow through red lights and not even slow down.

Years ago I bought a Mack tractor from a gravel hauler. The truck was totally stripped, only one seat, air conditioning removed, front brakes removed, only one fuel tank, nothing that didn't need to be there to haul gravel was there. I asked him why the truck was so stripped down, he said he got paid by how much gravel he moved every day. That less the truck weighed, the more cargo it could haul.

What don't you understand? The liberal court system today with this video and all the fleet management elements they have on the truck, these folks or their families will receive huge compensation.

Why the personal attack? Do you have evidence that concludes my remarks are invalid?
.

Your remark was uncalled for and shows a lack of feeling for others.

I believe she was the one the guy was trying to get out of the car when the Fedex truck showed up.

I didn't realize members here lived sheltered lives.

As I stated, I feel bad for those that died. However, it could have been prevented. Those trucks still use CB radios - I am sure there were warnings issues on channel 19.

What don't you understand? Anyone who was involved in that impact is either dead, or badly injured. Would you trade your health for money? Or your life? And working in the industry I work in, I understand a lot more about this than you do. Auto accident settlements aren't nearly the financial windfall that you think they are.

Very tough to watch honestly

God Bless those involved

I got the call at work for this one

https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/27/us/wisconsin-pileup-911-trnd/index.html

My wife was involved

Well, is she okay?

I saw this on the news but was too lazy to look up where in Fort Worth it happened. Was it near that spot where everything merges with 35W (Belknap, 121, and more)? That part of 35 has always been crazy, even in good conditions. I lived in Fort Worth for most of my life, but I moved away 14 years ago and every time I return, I'm amazed at how fast everyone drives. If the speed limit is 65 mph and I'm going 70 on an interstate, literally everyone is passing me.

By the way, bee1971, I'm sorry to hear that your wife was involved. Is she OK?

It was soundbound I-35W, just south of 28th street, where the road makes a slight bend to the left and the road starts sloping down toward the river, there's the long bridge over the RR tracks, near Long Ave and 33rd street. It looks like a passing shower from west to east dropped some freezing rain there immediately before the accident which explains why no southbounder had any warning of a slick road condition. It looks to have been a near perfect trap.

As I understand it, NTTA is responsible for their toll lanes maintenance, I don't know if NTTA pre treated the road or not, I'm sure TxDot did their portion. in the pic you can see the concrete paving portion denoting the bridge vs. the asphalt at grade level. The river is just south of the pic.

Several years ago we passed through a front while traveling south on 287, went from cool and dry to warm and humid, in just a second every window in the truck was fogged to opaque. 75 MPH with no warning to no vision was kinda scary. NO warning at all, similar to what happened on the bridge. 2¢

~ 12 to 15 seconds you can see the pileup at the south end of the bridge.

I hear that so often from people who live in areas prone to ice and snow. Every now and then, one of them gets caught in an ice storm down here and they change their tune to "you can't drive on that stuff."

Black ice is black ice. You never see it but it gets you just the same.

People scoff at DFW for closing down with 2 inches of snow. Most of the time it's ice accumulation, not snow. That's impassable. With rare exception it's gone in one or two days so it's cheaper and easier to just shut down.

We're due to get 3-8 inches of snow (depending on which forecast you watch) Sunday and Monday, Temps in the single digits. We'll see how it shakes out.

Ouch!!

Don’t Drive On Wet Roads Below 35 Degrees

Particularly at night

If it has rained or snowed within the last (24) hours - if there have been
high winds that can blow accumulated snow across a plowed roadway,
wait until the sun has been up at least an hour before you get on the road.

If road conditions require chains - stay off the road until conditions improve.

I am starting my day in Kingman, Arizona.

I got into town around 12 noon yesterday,
had my tires rotated & balanced - spent the night.

I held up because of road conditions around Flagstaff.

Some of the most dangerous road sections
in the lower (48) states in Winter are:

I-40 between Williams & Flagstaff, Arizona.

I-40 between Gallup & Grants, New Mexico.

I-40 between Albuquerque & Tucumcari, New Mexico.

Black Ice doesn’t give a sh!t whether you are a 3000
pound car or an 80,000 pound semi truck & trailer.

You are a hockey puck on an ice rink

No load is worth dying for



It is the responsibility of the Driver - not the Dispatcher
to decide whether or not to be on the road.

There are enough apps - alerts - weather warnings
to inform of road conditions if you avail yourself of them.


Jim

We used to have signs like that around here. Apparently they were a challenge to the reading comprehension impaired. They've slowly been changed to "bridge may be icy".

I think goats do pretty well on ice. Camels obviously have no clue it even exists.

Winter driving 101: something somewhere is gonna be a lot slicker than you think it is. Somebody somewhere is gonna be driving like a complete idiot, often in a minivan.

I grew up in the Chicago area, learned to drive in winter weather when the most sophisticated computer in the car was the meat one between my ears.

I live in W. Texas now and when this ice storm rolled in I stayed home. Had a job in Midland, 120 miles each way, Thursday. Got up Thursday morning, went to the local gas station to fill up even though I had enough gas to get there and back lessons learned long ago taught me to fill up in case of crappy weather because you never know. Got done with the fill up, got on the major road leading out of town and immediately the tail end of the truck is kicking out on me, regardless of traction control. Turned left at the next intersection, went home, called the customer and told him not going to happen. I probably could have gotten to the job but I was pretty sure I wasn't going to get home at the end of the day and I sure didn't want to deal with idiots trying to drive like it's the Indy 500 in those conditions. Customer had a six hour drive back to Austin in front of him after the job was done, he wouldn't have made it had he left at the end of the day. Told him good luck getting home, which was all I could do.

My daughter lives up in the DFW area and they never even opened that day due to weather. So she stayed home, my SIL is a cop so he doesn't get that option.

You guys that live up north just don’t understand what happens in this part of the country. It’s not like up north. It can be nice and dry one place and a rain shower will dump enough moisture a mile or two away to freeze as soon as it hits the road. The temps can change pretty fast as well. I 20 where I live in Abilene is one of the most dangerous stretches of state for that reason. This was on a down sloping bridge with heavy traffic anyway. They had no warning. I’ve driven on that spot. 40mph would have yielded the same results. It was a perfect storm that cost lives. We don’t have enough equipment to de ice all of the places that need it all at once. It’s best to stay home but some don’t have that choice.

I believe its been over 15? years that truck swould never pass a required DOT inspection without functioning brakes on every axle, so I hope your experience was before they clamped down.

So I suspect, based on previously experience here, in a few days there will threads about FEDEX always being late with their deliveries .

First of all you have no clue so stfu. These contract drivers for Fed EX drive like the have no brain. I'm out there with them. I've had a class A CDL with hazmat for 30 yrs. I see it you don't ,so you are not qualified to speak on this subject .

Front brakes weren't required on semi tractors until model year 1978. At the time I was operating that truck, any chassis that was titled 1977 or older was grandfathered in and did not have to have front brakes. This truck had a '77 chassis with a newer glide kit cab on it but was still titled as a 77. Before anti-lock brakes, front brakes on a semi tractor probably caused more harm than good anyway. All the weight was on the drive tires, so you lose your steering in a panic stop when the front's lock up.

Exactly. All the weight on the drives cause steering problems in the snow ,ice and mud with front axle push.

I'm down between Houston and Galveston. No single digits predicted here, but, I think for the first time ever, a wind chill advisory has been issued.

The biggest problem for our area is that they simply don't have the equipment to deal with this kind of weather and conditions. There's a LOT of bridges and overpasses in the Houston area, and only a handful of trucks to prep them.

Saw on the news this morning where a group of cars got stuck on an overpass for over 3 hrs waiting for help. The thing I didn't get was that they were on the downward side. I think I would have tried a slow creep before sitting that long. (I base my viewpoint on me being from the East and having driven in these conditions).

I filled the tanks in the cars, and did my shopping, so I'm good for several days. Just gonna stay hunkered down, and occasionally go out on the porch and listen to cars collide off in the distance..... .....

Be safe everyone.

https://abc13.com/weather/

I watched the footage of this crash - one of the most sickening things I ever watched. The FedEx driver was flying.

Once we were a little East of Sierra Blanca, TX. & it was evening - probably Jan. or Feb. around 1986 - it was dark out. The I-10 Westbound was suddenly closed - never had that happen before. All traffic was forced to exit at a truck stop. I was in a car, my partner & another guy that worked for us were in the 1-ton & 50 foot gooseneck. We asked a police officer what was going on & he said the highway was a sheet of ice for about the next 3 miles, then it warmed up as you got closer to El Paso. We sat there for about an hour - we did NOT want to spend the night in our vehicles! My partner & John decided they wanted to take the chance to go the 3 miles of ice - I was against the decision. The same cop told my partner that he would let him go, but all bets were off - like don't blame us if you wreck! AND, it was downhill too. Anyway, my partner decided they would take the gamble - like creep at 30 MPH down the road & drive out of the danger. I followed them reluctantly & we made it. Still scares me thinking about it all these years later.

Only time I'll drive in this kind of crap anymore is if I literally get trapped while out driving, and twice in the last 4 years got caught in bad winter conditions, & took the first exit & got a hotel. Get a good night's sleep & drive in the next day. It is just not worth it to gamble with your life for a little drive down the road. OR, if you are not too far from home, GET OFF THE HIGHWAY & take surface streets!

Need a Jamie Davis to sort that mess out.

So.....how do you make that jump? What schooling did you get in your past to make the jump to blaming the customer? Shift the blame, there may be none, just a bad situation. The customer expects safety first, at least most do I just want to know how you get there so my kids, and grandkids can avoid that kind of an education. It was a weather fluke at best, or a driver that was irresponsible at worst. The driver is responsible for operating in [censored] conditions, ask the DOT, if the weather changed over a short period, it was an accident. Customers are not at all to blame.

Real simple, based on previous record here, the "jump" is made by pure self centered hypocrisy, in that few care about a 100+ car pile up, under conditions that enticed over 100 plus other drivers to make the same mistake , resulting in 6 lives lost and dozens of injuries, but I want my car part on time, because "thats what I paid for" attitude, and if you haven't seen that attitude prior, you have not been paying attention.

You do know misguided arrogance is not very confidence inspiring. BTW, I had a "chauffeurs" license in 1969, which was grandfathered into my Class A CDL aprrox 30 years later when they became the requirement, with my hazmat endorsement. So, you may want to share what you define as having a "clue" really is, because so far, you might be who you are describing here.

FRONT-WHEEL BRAKES REQUIRED ON TRUCKS RULE AFFECTS MEDIUM-, HEAVY-DUTY RIGS
LEO ABRUZZESE | Jan 27, 1987


"The Department of Transportation reversed a longstanding policy and ordered truckers to install properly working brakes on the front wheels of all medium- and heavy-duty rigs.

The agency's new requirement, which is expected to draw fire from some fleets and many truck drivers, is designed to improve highway safety by

helping tractor trailers make faster, more stable stops.Industry insiders immediately questioned whether the new standard would sway the thousands of drivers who routinely disconnect or disable front-wheel brakes.

Moreover, some engineers raised fears the new brake requirement could actually lead to weaker brakes on some big rigs.

The department's new brake rule is in response to a truck safety law approved by Congress last session.

The Commercial Motor Vehicle Safety Act, which established uniform national standards for truck driver licensing, also ordered the secretary of transportation to require operating brakes on all wheels.

Existing federal law has allowed truckers to remove front-wheel brakes on any three-axle tractor or straight truck.

The new rule mandates steering axle brakes on all vehicles over 10,000 pounds manufactured after July 24, 1980.

Truckers will have until Feb. 27, 1988, to reconnect existing front-wheel brakes or reinstall brakes that had been removed."

https://www.joc.com/front-wheel-brakes-required-trucks-rule-affects-medium-heavy-duty-rigs_19870127.html#:~:text=HEAVY%2DDUTY%20RIGS-,FRONT%2DWHEEL%20BRAKES%20REQUIRED%20ON%20TRUCKS%20RULE,MEDIUM%2D%2C%20HEAVY%2DDUTY%20RIGS&text=Existing%20federal%20law%20has%20allowed,manufactured%20after%20July%2024%2C%201980.

Not sure about grandfathered no front axle brakes before 1977, which has to be today an extreme rarity.