Loose bucket blamed for multi-car accidents

[sequoias]

Check the pictures in that link. I was in a few mile back up because of that, it's a big mess when I passed it, but no vehicles there...just cleaning up the mess.

Loose bucket blamed for multi-car crash on I-90 | KOMO News - Seattle, Washington | Local & Regional

MERCER ISLAND, Wash. -- A loose bucket in the road is being blamed for causing a multi-car crash on Interstate 90 that left six people injured at the start of the Monday evening commute.
Troopers said a black 10-gallon bucket, which was rolling around in the left westbound lane, caused the crash just before 4 p.m. near the bridge's midspan.

They said the driver of a sedan slammed on his brakes to avoid the bucket and caused a chain-reaction crash involving four other cars and a semi truck. Four of the drivers were trapped in their cars and had to be cut out of their vehicles by firefighters.

Six people were taken to Harborview Medical Center with non-life threatening injuries.

The semi was hauling approximately 20 gallons of paint at the time of the incident, and much of it was spilled on the roadway. Between 5 and 10 gallons of the paint ran down the storm drain and into Lake Washington, troopers said.

Traffic was backed up across the bridge in both directions for three hours after the crash.

Investigators are looking for the car from which the black bucket originally fell. Anyone who may have seen a bucket fly off of a vehicle on the roadway around 3:30 p.m. Monday is urged to call troopers at (425) 401-7788.

Crews from the Mercer Island Fire Department and Seattle Fire Department responded to the crash.

 

[shel90]

Scary! I cant imagine how freaked out the driver had to be when trying to avoid the bucket.

My mom had something similiar like that happen to her. A big truck carrying tires with ropes strapped around them to hold them in was in front of her on the highway. One of the ropes snapped free and a tire came rolling off of the truck heading towards my mom's car. She swerved/slammed on the brakes to avoid it and as a result, several cars crashed into each other. Another tire came loose and slammed onto my mom's windshield, crushing it. Luckily, my mom and the other people in her car werent seriously hurt. I dont know if the passengers of the other vehicles were seriously hurt or not. My mom was afraid to drive for a while after that.

 

[darkage]

That's nothing news to me.
I lived in Seattle for 5 years.

Many times, I saw not right package or something not safe for highway in Seattle.

One morning, I saw very fresh flesh pink/red meat with brown fur on I-5 highway at near old Kingdome Stadium. Then, I glimpsed piece of dog's two ears on the road. More like dog fell off from pick-up truck. (usually, I saw dog rode at pickup truck's rear without leashes)

Other time.... late evening, I saw two cars quick avoid hit the car. Then, I made quick change lane. Oh... I can't believe to see car got stuck with block of hay. I looked at driver... he shocked. I was lucky in less than 10 second different time.

Few times, I saw flying tire from I-5 north into I-5 south. The tire kept roll for over half mile.

 

[VamPyroX]

That's why it's important to keep your eyes on the road and be aware of your surroundings. It's also important to keep a good distance behind vehicles in front of you so that you have enough time and distance to stop or enough time to take different action.

I've seen some accidents on highways caused by the driver driving too close behind the vehicle in front of him/her.

For instance, if there was a huge carpet roll on the road and I was driving too close to the vehicle in front of me... what would happen if the vehicle in front of me had time to respond? That vehicle would either stop or swerve out of the way. If he stopped, I would be too close and end up rear-ending that vehicle. If he swerved out of the way, I wouldn't have time to stop or swerve out of the way since I had less warning than the vehicle in front of me.

 

[Jiro]

and also -try to overcome your panic instinct to not slam on brake. Just drive thru bucket and you will be ok. Your car will have some damage but it's not going to cause you to crash.

I've driven over some unknown objects and yes I did curse after hitting it cuz it was a very hard thump and my car did sustain minor damage. I have no idea what I ran over but it's certainly a lot safer than just slamming on brake or making hard swerve that may or may not hit other driver.

However - a mattress on the road.... now that's a different story

 

[VamPyroX]

and also -try to overcome your panic instinct to not slam on brake. Just drive thru bucket and you will be ok. Your car will have some damage but it's not going to cause you to crash.

I've driven over some unknown objects and yes I did curse after hitting it cuz it was a very hard thump and my car did sustain minor damage. I have no idea what I ran over but it's certainly a lot safer than just slamming on brake or making hard swerve that may or may not hit other driver.

However - a mattress on the road.... now that's a different story

I was thinking the same thing about the mattress. Heh!

You're right... try not to panic too much.

I've seen some people who panic too much that they actually spin the steering wheel drastically in a manner that they end up running into the wall when they could have simply turned it a little bit to get around it.

 

[sequoias]

and also -try to overcome your panic instinct to not slam on brake. Just drive thru bucket and you will be ok. Your car will have some damage but it's not going to cause you to crash.

I've driven over some unknown objects and yes I did curse after hitting it cuz it was a very hard thump and my car did sustain minor damage. I have no idea what I ran over but it's certainly a lot safer than just slamming on brake or making hard swerve that may or may not hit other driver.

However - a mattress on the road.... now that's a different story

Yeah, I ran over a huge chunk of metal part on the street that I couldn't swerve around it and didn't have time to stop. It caused the gas tank to leak when it ripped up the gas tank and I had to get a used gas tank for $250 with labor charges, not too bad. That was a long time ago on the other car I used to have.

 

[Calvin]

I've seen mattress, cones, wood, and even a metal ladder on the highway...

talk about road hazard that we gotta watch out...

 

[Jiro]

I've seen mattress, cones, wood, and even a metal ladder on the highway...

talk about road hazard that we gotta watch out...

metal ladder?

 

[Calvin]

metal ladder?

Yep probably fell off the commercial truck or van..

 

[Dixie]

Around here it's mostly trashbags full of trash that people haul to the county landfill themselves once a month and it blows out of their vehicle going down the road, that, and lots and lots of roadkill.

However, I did see 500 pound breast meat combos fall out of the back of a Tyson truck. Someone forgot to latch the door shut. The driver hit a bump, the door came open, and out comes 500 pounds of raw chicken out at you. Funny, but it's not. Those combos can do a shit load of damage when it lands on your vehicle. The driver ended up losing 3 combos before someone was able to pull him over and let him know he was losing his load!

Another time, a live haul truck had some cages that weren't shut properly and the chickens were flying out of the cage, because I was driving down a road and in the middle of a busy 3 lane highway I saw this broiler hen standing in the middle of the turning lane, I was like WTF? I drove a couple miles further and I found a squashed chicken on highway 7 where it's 5 lane traffic. Another two chickens were found squashed on the Dardanelle Bridge. Then I found a couple of hens standing on the concrete divider at the main intersection Dardanelle. I was like holy shit, some live hauler is in for a major ass chewing when he arrives with a less than complete load.

I didn't stop for the chickens though, it was too dangerous (high traffic areas) to try and chase them and not only that they are unsuitable as pets, and the processor would have been unable to take them for processing due to health and safety reasons. (Where have the chickens been, have they ingested something questionable, what have they come in contact with?)