Truckers draw attention in 140-vehicle pileup in Texas

On Behalf of | Nov 26, 2012 | Truck Accidents |

Patrik Jonsson, writing for MinnPost, wonders whether truck drivers with heavy, hard-to-slow loads should slow down to avoid potentially fatal accidents, such as the accident that happened on Interstate 10 in Texas over the Thanksgiving holiday.

Many people sustained serious injuries in this accident.

He quotes one new trucker who wrote about his fellow truck drivers speeding in bad weather. “[M]any super truckers were flying by me in the pea soup…”

Fog was chiefly to blame, but the first collision led to another, and then another and another, until there were 140 motor vehicles involved in the pileup, resulting in at least two deaths and many other serious injuries.

And those two deaths were apparently caused by a big rig rear-ending an SUV.

Weather was a major factor in the Thanksgiving pileup, but likely so was speeding. Jonsson quotes one Texas motorist: “Probably a better solution,” said the motorist, “is to put a lower speed limit on those crazy big rigs. The speed limit on 20 S of Midland is 80. I often travel this road and the big rigs just go flying past me.”

Source: Texas highway pileup: time to slow the ‘super truckers’ down?