Highway horror - BostonHerald.com


You have to wonder just exactly what the "safety concerns" were....and you gotta wonder.....Just how well was that loader chained down! Any bets that only two chains were used? One across the bucket that was loose....and one across the back frame at the hitch-points....that was loose???

Simple incompetence.......at it's ....what...best?

 

That story is tough to follow, all over the place with info of the scene. Were they doing a test drive to show it wouldn't work right and ended up getting someone killed? I've done a test drive with a piece of equipment, it was to see if the truck had the power to pull said piece. We only went 3 miles and did not get on the Interstate to test it out.

 

National Grid is the local power company so there are deep pockets for lawsuits.

 

And that would be the proper manner in which to do a test.

The accident itself is pretty self-explanatory. The National Grid unit was in lane to left of the "slow-lane" or right-hand lane. Whether the van was passing the National Grid unit or the unit was passing the van is irrelevant. The backhoe fell off, what I would assume was an equipment trailer (such as what you pull) attached to the dump truck. They could not have seriously been using the "old style" of hooking the front-end loader buck over the back of the dump bed, lifting the loader's front-end off the ground, and towing in that fashion........not in this day and sue happy age.

 

And you can bet that those most "inconvenienced" by the road closures resulting because of the accident have already started theirs!!

 

It says per the driver that the trailer with the backhoe on it started swaying side to side as he was coming down the hill. At some point the swaying was so bad that the backhoe rolled right off the trailer to the side. From the photo I see, a chain must have somewhat held on as it looks like the backhoe went off the right side of the trailer and pulled the truck that way, off into the woods on the right side of the highway. I would suspect that they had the backhoe weight too far back which caused the trailer to start swaying around on them along with not properly strapping it down.

 

It does sound like he had the weight too far to the rear. If it was properly secured the backhoe should have stayed chained to the trailer.

 

Up north, you will see rigs layed over usually from ice, and if the load is secured properly, it stays with the trailer.
IMO this wasn't even given the basic load securement, if the load came loose while fishtailing.
I doubt any criminal negligence will be brought, but this stinks, and about all you can hope, is a few guys get canned.

I read some of the local comments. Looks like people want to fight over the Union worker compentance in this as well.
Doesn't look like this was the regular driver, who probably complained to fleet maintenance about this to begin with.

 

I know somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody that was delayed in traffic. Do ya think i have a lawsuit? :smokin:

 

awah...just one more degree of seperation, and Kevin Bacon would have been trone in there. :block: