Physics can be fun and destructive!

[gridlore]

This morning in the section of the Bay Bridge approach known to locals as the MacArthur Maze, a tanker truck went a little too fast, and had an oopsie. Well, actually, he crashed and his tanker full of unleaded exploded.

But that's not the fun part. No, the fun part is he was under the 580/80 connector ramp when his load began to oxidize rapidly, releasing large amounts of heat. Which softened the steel supports of said connector ramp, which meant that gravity soon noticed this big chunk of concrete and asphalt with no viable means of support, reached out, and...







Here's the full story.

The driver? Crawled out of the wreck on his own, hailed a cab, and is now in the hospital with critical but non-life threatening burns.

You cannot begin to imagine how happy I am that my route doesn't come near the Bay Bridge. I see a surge in ridership on BART and the ferries. Right now, they have no estimate on how long this will take to fix, but one official on the radio said "could be a couple of months."

Comments

[glinda-w.livejournal.com]

*stunned*

never seen pavement melt or *bend* before, usually it just breaks/shatters.

amazing.

[gridlore.livejournal.com]

I've already seen suggestions that the section involved be renamed the Salvaldor Dali Impass until repairs are complete.

[glinda-w.livejournal.com]

*snork*

It is rather Dali-esque, isn't it?

And no one was killed. that's the *really* amazing thing, to me.

[capplor.livejournal.com]

That melting & bending of the steel supports (not the concrete) was instrumental in the World Trade collapse.

Cement, when made right anymore, will melt before it fractures. That it did here is a good thing. That bodes well for the surrounding parts of the structures involved.

It's still impressive.