The Isle of Sheppey Bridge Disaster 2013 | Plainly Difficult Documentary
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On the morning of 5 September 2013, more than 130 vehicles were involved in a series crashes on the southbound carriageway of the Isle of Sheppey Bridge.....
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CHAPTERS:
00:00 Intro
01:47 Background
05:28 Disaster
09:07 Aftermath
10:03 Scale
10:39 Outro Song
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Would you go the isle of Sheppey?
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I went many years ago, a friend of mine went to apply for a job as a prison warder there...
Yes
I got a pile up. Check out Texas on black ice just a couple of years ago. Some good live footage on it.
Actually no, I have enough mist and fog here in the Pacific Northwest thank you very much!!!🙏👍👻
Let me get this straight, nothing has been done to rectify the lighting, speed or lack of shoulders on said bridge...well good luck with that Mates!!!🙏🤔😵💫🚗😵🪦
This man is so dedicated to making videos for us, he went to the Isle of Sheppey to get footage for us - a place where no sane person would go by choice.
I spent a couple weeks there over 2 summers as a kid. I was the only American on the isle i think
At Stupid O'clock in the morning, no less
Trust me I live on the other side of the planet and I definitely appreciate the extra mile PD goes for us!!!🙏👍👻
@@alexnmott I would imagine you being not to sure if you were the only yank on the Isle is the foggy conditions!!! 🙏👍👻
I live across the Atlantic Ocean in one of the former 13 British colonies and I do also appreciate the lengths he goes
There were a couple of other things that I understood about this incident. Firstly was that the fog only covered the top of the bridge, the beginning of the ramp was below it and had good visibility, hence why people were driving on to it at 70mph, only to have their visibility rapidly reduced as they drove up. The other was that the collisions only stopped because a truck on the Bridge alerted another truck by CB as to what was happening, and he deliberately stopped and blocked the ramp at the bottom with his truck where the visibility was OK, and stopped more cars going on to the bridge.
Those lorry drivers are heroes
What are the speed limitis on highways in the UK generally? I never went there. But I intend to go next year. Can someone tell me?
@@xminusone1 70mph on motorways and dual carriage way's, 60mph on single lane "A" and "B" roads unless marked/sign posted differently, 20/30mph in city's, towns and village's, most speeds are sign posted with repeater signs though, these speeds are reduced by 10mph if driving lorry's and coaches and also if towing a trailer or caravan.
@@xminusone1 70mph motorways/dual carriageways, 60mph single carriageway, 30mph where there are streetlights unless signed otherwise.
@@Ju1ian10001 Thank you.
agonising for the drivers who drove at a safe speed, stopped short of the pile-up, and were crashed into by the people behind going too fast.
Plus insurance would determine them "at fault" if their car was pushed into a car ahead. Maybe front/rear facing video evidence will change that practice.
@@collectorguy3919
Car insurance... one of the biggest legal rackets going.
@@skylined5534 if it wasnt for the 50 odd ways they cant milk money out of Joe Public for car ownership they wouldve never promoted it to the extent that they did
Might as well drive recklessly and have fun then
@@collectorguy3919
Reminds me of a 50+ car pile up in the Netherlands, where the insurances got together and instead of lengthy procedures on who is to fault. The insurances just said that each car insurance pays for their own car, no matter what kind of insurance they had (liability only or full). This worked quite well because nobody complained and it saved millions of lawyer costs.
My step dad tells a story of the time he was driving back home at night, in thick fog, along country roads. He had been a plumber and heating engineer all his working life, and knew the roads like the back of his hand. After a while he noticed a car following him, and soon a few cars behind that. No one wanted to overtake in the fog.
He eventually got home and parked up outside his house in a small village. As he stopped, he saw the cars behind him stop. As he got out, he saw the other drivers get out. One of the came forward and asked, "do you know where we are?" He replied, "well I'm home, but I don't know about you!"
Based stepdad
to be fair, I'm pretty sure he was able to tell the others where they were
I like how Plainly John in the field and Plainly John in the studio are indistinguishable voice-overs. The irreverent little humour of the channel is one of the best features.
Thank you
Plainly John: "In today's video, the part of Plainly John will be played by Plainly John." 😁
What if all of his voice-overs are done in the car?
and you've never seen them in the same place at the same time either..hmmm
@@TheHikeChoseMe It's a conspiracy theory in the making! Sound Tinfoit Hat Alert!
I-77 in Virginia is the poster child of how to do a fog-addled highway right. After several multi-car pileups causing several deaths, the road was modified with better lane markings, big reflectors to indicate where the road was, and (probably most importantly) large bright LED speed limit signs that can instantly adjust speed limits due to the foggy or snowy conditions.
Also I-5 in California is very bad for fog.
@@neighborhoodcatlady6094 I was thinking the same thing.
If only some other highways in Virginia were that good. They did some of that on I64 near the infamously foggy Afton Mountain but I81 can get bad. I live in Virginia.
@@neighborhoodcatlady6094 Grapevine is hell during winter
Yup, the variable limit signs automatically adjust the speed by measuring the refraction of a laser beam between the signs, as more light gets scattered the intensity at the receiver drops and that can be measured as a drop in voltage by the electronics. All the signs in the area are linked so once fog develops in any given stretch all the signs before that area start dropping the limit.
The system has made that stretch much safer (along with the shutdown of the paper mill which contributed to fog formation in one particularly bad valley), but I still won't drive that section in bad winter weather because I experienced glare ice due to frozen fog, if the weather looks bad in that area I'll take I75 instead, the lower peaks means less chance of nasty weather.
Not a single death, or a single fire. Miracles do happen. Even on the Isle of Sheppey.
Technically this crash happened in Kent, not on the Isle of Sheppey, if we assume the border in in the middle of the Swale. So Sheppey still gets no miracles.
@@IAMPLEDGE sheppey is in kent mate
The main reason why no-one was killed in that crash was because of a quick-thinking lorry driver who used his lorry to intentionally block off the entrance to the bridge, preventing more cars from coming on before emergency services got there.
So what would have happened that day if it weren’t for that lorry driver blocking the entrance to the bridge? I believe what would have happened is that there would have been at least _some_ fatalities since people likely would have been killed in that pile-up if the entrance to the bridge hadn’t been blocked off.
I love these traffic ones, its something that almost all of us can relate to. And there is no shortage of traffic disasters and near disasters.
Thank you
@@PlainlyDifficult now you just need to find an absurdly large traffic accident that also somehow involves a nuclear excursion
@@ElTurbinado The closest I've got is an 87 vehicle pileup on Highway 401 in 1999, just north of Windsor, Ontario in Canada, (right across the river from Detroit), where there was thick fog, on a stretch of road that I can personally confirm makes everyone drives like a maniac, and one tractor trailer unexpectedly slowed down, causing the once behind it to jackknife, then another couple of cars crashed into it... And then all those 87 wrecked cars and trucks caught on fire, and then something exploded, and the fireball and smoke went so high that we could see it two towns away.
I was driving on the 401 that day in the opposite direction, listening to reports of the horror - people stuck in this immense heap of burning wreckage that took days to stop - watching the smoke recede in the rearview. I heard later that the fire had been so hot that even after they finally cleared all the wreckage away, which had been difficult since so much of it had melted together, they also needed to completely repave the road, which had been completely liquified.
Legend says that day saw the highest concentration the UK has ever seen of people swearing per square meter, excluding a pub on match day.
This is one of the only disasters on this channel where I feel like the main culprit were ultimately the victims themselves.
Driving that fast in fog without fog lights, knowing damn well that you will never be able to react in time if anything shows up in front of you is sheer stupidity.
Designing a bridge with zero lighting like that in an area prone to dense fog is the absolute dumbest shit I have heard in a while, and I live in Florida where everything is stupid
N they could drive off the edge. Imagine that at 70mph ...
Well you just know there were plenty of responsible drivers that stopped in time when they saw the pile up only to be rear ended by some other idiot. Thank god there was no lorry rear ending a car at full speed or there would've been deaths.
@@Tsumami__ listen, there is a mountain national road where I live and it is often cloudy and foggy. I rode up there during the worst fogs, I rode with my fog lights on and quite slowly as everyone else on that road. I can assure you that even though this road is not lit at all, has quite a lot of traffic, has a very sinuous path and lots of animals cross it, there has never been accidents involving multiple cars. Why ? Because people aren't dumb and drive slowly and carefully. Even I had occurrences where deers crossed the road during a horrible fog and I could react in time as all car drivers should be able to if they are careful. Yeah sure, the bridge could be lit up, part of the blame can rest on that, however there is no doubt in my mind that the biggest part of the responsibility in this car pileup was the drivers themselves. If you want another example of mine, there is a highway I found myself onto during a fog and the drivers were driving at 30-40 km/h on the 120km/h speed limit highway, the speed being reasonable for the situation we were in.
Ultimately, there is no doubt in my mind that driving the speed limit when you got 10m visibility like it was stated in the video is the dumbest fucking thing anyone could do and their cars being wrecked is the minimum they could've gone out with considering no one was killed.
Welcome to Kent.
"Stupid o' Clock."
Oh, yeah. Been there.
We've got some stretches of road that are notorious for heavy fog, and high-speed roads. Tennessee, especially, is subject to that unfortunate combination. Horrible weather-related vast piles-up have been fairly frequent. Should you wish to do another video on this subject, southern Appalachia has what you need.
We've had a few big pile-ups in Canada as well. Winter storms are a common cause. Thick fog isn't unusual in southwest Ontario where I live.
So does Texas. My least favorite stretch of road down south is the Atchafalaya bridge/ causeway. I'm not crazy about high bridges, anyway. I loved Boliver ferry, so I could avoid the Galveston causeway to the mainland!
The mountains are the worst for driving in fog. Switchback turns, hundred plus foot sheer dropoffs, narrow or no margins, and many times, narrow lines.
Hmmm.... Maybe bridges aren't so bad. ✌😸
@@PhoenixLyon I'm terrified of heights and not a fan of high bridges either.
@@cottagebob2551 check out the Blue Monster in San Diego, or the Delaware Memorial Bridge, or... If you REALLY need a fright, the Mackinac Bridge (pronounced 'Makinaw') in Michigan.
@@lairdcummings9092 Would you mind if I took a pass? :)
I have witnessed fog so thick, that you could "cut it" with your hands. Visibility practically 1 meter. I was driving at night, very slowly, practically just in second gear and slightly above idle rpm. My biggest worry was that someone might crash into my back even though I turned on my fog light. Nothing happened, but I felt very, very uncomfortable about it, expected a rear crash. The fog situation was on road 505/II in Slovakia, where the speed limit is 70 km/h. I also witnessed a very strong storm while driving on the autobahn. Everyone started to slow down, most put hazards on and eventually we all stopped. I was so happy that other drivers acted well in that situation. Visibility was very bad, the amount of water on the road was also unusually high. I have never seen any storm like that in my life again. It was all over in 3 minutes or so and gradually we started moving. Nothing bad happened. It was on the A4 motorway in Austria.
About fog lights. Once you drive fast enough, fog lights on modern cars automatically turn off, because the software of the car determines that once you can drive so fast, you must be out of the fog and you just forgot to turn the fog light off. So the car does it for you above a certain speed (maybe 50 km/h?). Very often I see older cars with fog lights constantly lit, even though there is no fog. Even when I alert the drivers about it, they usually do not get it and keep on driving without checking why I flash them. If someone flashes me from behind I immediately begin to check if my lights are on, what lights are on and think about what could possibly be wrong with my car.
with the way people speed everywhere in EU i'd be worried about a crash from behind too, lol. 70 limit means the average speed on that road is 110(at least in poland)
That would not auger well in Australia, with our wildlife! Back in the 1970's, the family used to run a truck to Broken Hill, from Adelaide. Once you get past Burra, the kangaroos were and still are everywhere. What was found that, if you had wide throw fog lights, turn them on, and you could run at 80 km/h in safety, as the wildlife could see what was around them. Run with pencil beam driving lights, and that would bring the wildlife into the beam of the light, and onto the road!
With the tail lights, it is suspected that the rear fog light is an 18 / 25 watt globe. The intensity is close to the brake lights, and brake lights are generally 18 watt globes. Blinker lights are the same as the brake lights but the tail lights are generally 5 watt.
It gets like that along the Sheppey way, it's all low laying marshland and can be especially bad in winter.
Im in Australia, and in my part of the world we usually only get thin fogs. Earlier this year though at the beginning of winter we had a fog descend in the early evening while I was out with the family an hour and a half away from home. The place we were at got foggy but it wasnt too bad, but the closer we got back home the thicker it got. The last part of the journey is usually a 20 minute trip along a small country road with no markers what so ever. The fog along that section got so thick we couldnt even see the sides of the road, and ended up travelling along at around 10 to 15kph and using the feel of the tyres going off the road to find our way along. It took well over an hour to finish that last section and took 3hrs in total to drive back home. This was the thickest fog I have ever encountered in 25 years of driving.
@@Jedda73 Wow. Literally driving through clouds.
As someone who understands that one does not simply walk into the Isle of Sheppey, your dedication is truly inspiring.
I lived a few years in Germany where rear fog lights are also required. It's illegal to run them when there _isn't_ fog, but like uncanceled turn signals, it happens. Those things are *painfully bright* when there's no fog between you and the car in front!
I've never had a car with fog lights that did anything noticeable
Here in the states headlight bulb manufacturers have developed insanely bright bulbs. Low beams are now as bright, or in some cases brighter, than standard high beams. It is super dangerous, not to mention annoying. Some of the car manufacturers have had to issue recalls due to the excessive headlamp brightness.
Same in DK. Also, when there's the slightest mist, the 5% stupidest drivers turn it on. Even when the visibility is well beyond 200 m.
The US has gotten increasingly bright headlights - and other signal lights. Its ridiculous. They emit a poor quality light AND they're blinding. Drivers can't see whats ahead of them because of the poor quality and poor spread of light. And anything near the beams is blinded. makes no sense.
@@ae2948 one of the worst aspects of the new Super bright bulbs is that they overpower standard bulbs. If you have the misfortune of being followed by someone with these new bulbs it casts a shadow in front of your vehicle. These bright bulbs must exceed federal standards but there seems to be little enforcement of the aftermarket industry.
My dad always taught me that Prior Planning Prevented Pissful Performance. This bridge and its construction proves it.
My Sergeant taught me 2 versions:
Proper planning promotes premier performance.
Piss-poor planning promotes piss-poor performance.
So you're saying that your dad is Diamond from the Oppenheimer Ranch project?🤔 .... does he know I mean it's really none of my business but. .jk👏🏻🤘🏻
Context he says that all the time at the end of his videos ...check it out
A lot of these stories go "The experts advised this. The politicians then ignored them and choose a cheaper option instead, without ever reading the underlaying report as to why this design had been advised in the first place"
It's happened to my company as well.
I've been sent a letter by a town council demanding to let them study the cause of the failure of an enforcement policy that was 'our fault'. It was supposed to root out zoning breaches, but there had been no enforcement cases in half a year after a policy had been installed.
Except we had advised something way different, way more strict, they ignored us, and their half-baked soluton of all council members securing exceptions for their respective voter groups, had failed the policy. It ended being a rule that applied to everybody except everybody.
So our reply back to the council explained we had had severe problems deciding how we would help the council study the cause, since we were not it, but we had enclosed several mirrors that they could use to see the cause of the failure and then study.
It's a bit salty, but the first time around the idiots spent 4,5 hours tearing into our excellent report with their own no-clue asessments and demands for exceptions. The municipality then had the audacity to not pay us for that 4,5 hour torture session since 'that was included as a service with the report'.
So when they wanted yet more freebies AND throw around criticism with dishonest intent, this seemed the right answer. That place is one of the reasons my firm has a strict 'no work for governments' policy now.
@@mgtowdadTH-camSucksCoxks My Dad was a Sgt First Class, another favorite Dadisms of mine was "Can't never could do shit"
There’s lots of things wrong with that bridge which are mentioned in this video.
However the most glaring omission on the bridge is the lack of a sign on the Kent side that says “Abandon all Hope, Ye who enter Here” :)
That is needed
Is it that bad?
@@patrickreuvekamp see what Marlon Brando had to say about the place:
th-cam.com/video/VKcAYMb5uk4/w-d-xo.html
Lol
Man I remember this happening and it was wild. Although being someone local to the area seeing the footage and stuff of sights I see basically every day on a popular youtuber's channel is arguably even more wild. Thanks for this super interesting coverage
I was in a car driving in the opposite direction to go and see my grandparents. I still remember the sounds of cars hitting into each other and people climbing out of cars and running away - something that has stuck with me for years.
Same, think I was actually still living here when that happened (moved shortly thereafter 😅)
When I was taught to drive my instructor drummed into me that I MUST ALWAYS drive according to the conditions. You must be able to stop in the distance visible and adjust the gap to the vehicle ahead and your speed accordingly.
I don't think my instructor did, but my dad sure as hell did, and way before we were old enough to drive
Right common sense!
Makes lots of sense, but it doesn't stop the car behind you. Also you become an obstacle as you going much slower than most.
It is a terribly designed bridge, 50mph would be a better base line speed limit for it, with weather warning if possible.
If I reduce my speed according to the conditions and the numpty behind is so impatient, complacent, and foolishly over-estimates their ability to drive and stop in time, they’re the ones with the problem. 50mph would have been too fast for the visibility on the day. I see every winter eVen when fog warning are displayed on motorways people still race past at 80mph. People need to engage their brains, before their gears.
These days most instructors teach you how to pass and thats it.
By the way, US it seems every pickup/SUV driver knows where their fog lights are and they are currently using it right now to blind every other car in the highway.
That was my first thought! Big, loud, and brightly lit, that's what those drivers want from their attentionmobiles.
From observing those huge SUVs, it seems that their headlights are aimed too high forward than downward, so to light up the road surface many turn on fog lamps. I don't know if they are rolling off the manufacturer that way due to lack of competence, or there just isn't a legal required standard for headlight aim position.
I was almost involved in a fog-caused pile-up a few years back! Accidents like this don’t usually have fog that is uniform.
Instead, there are fog patches where visibility is good most of the time and then bad for a second or two.
When you’re driving at highway speed and go through one of these fog patches that’s over quickly, it gives you over-confidence when driving through the next fog patch.
The pile-ups that do happen in fog patches are caused by a mix of fast and slow traffic.
In this case, I believe people driving downward into the marsh area believed the fog patch was going to be over in a few seconds but were wrong.
This narrative that ‘drivers were just being stupid and driving too fast in zero visibility conditions’ might be true, but it doesn’t teach the public how to avoid the same situation.
It’s not that people were recklessly driving fast through the fog all day. It’s that people driving through fog patches at regular AND slow speeds-something that pretty much everyone does!
*These people in this pile-up over-confidently drove through a fog patch that lasted longer than expected and gained downhill speed on a curve in the process.*
These isolated weather patches are usually responsible for winter pile-ups too!
*It’s not the whole highway having bad weather that makes traveling dangerous, it’s when a small portion of it does.*
Fewer
[returns]
please.
Each sentence does not need to be separated by an empty line above and below. You can just put them in the same paragraph, like I did here.
We have defensive driving courses, why not add a foul weather, (severe rainstorm, snow fog, etc.) awareness as well? These monsoon rains hitting places like Las Vegas and Phoenix, aren't going to go away. Many lives are lost during these storms due to flash floods, so raising awareness may not be such a bad thing. I grew up in North Las Vegas, then moved to Florida, so I learned about flash floods, fog and hurricanes. And causeways. I hate causeways. ✌😸
The variability is an important point and I want to know more. I do know that lulls in bad weather have been factors in other kinds of accidents so this seems like something that might have been studied. Did the more elevated parts of the bridge have less fog as expected and drivers wrongly assumed there would be less at lower elevations?
this whole pileup was caused by 2 idiots that blocked the road. look at that van and audi, both look operable. if your vehicle moves clear the roadway as soon as you can. even if you leave plastic debris a flat tire is way better than a 100 car pileup.
Patchy fog - an important factor in a significant number of maritime incidents as well...
...ask the Andrea Doria and the Stockholm, for instance!
hard to believe i've been subscribed for 5+ years and the content is still both educational and entertaining most creators on yt fall off after about 2 years
Thank you
Hear-hear!
I'm subscribed to a lot of great channels but you can see how in comparison to later stuff their early stuff jars a little.
Plainly Difficult is superb and what's more, if you see the early stuff vs the newer stuff the level of quality and production was there already 'back in the day'.
Not many channels can claim to be this consistently good! Please never stop making content John, you're brill!
Thank you for the video!
My grandparents lived on the Isle, so we went over that bridge very often. Actually a pretty cool bridge, and Sheppey isn't that bad. I can definitely see how the incident happened, it's surprisingly steep!
There was a pretty massive crash on motorway D1 in Czechia in 2008. In total there was 231 damaged vehicles with 30 injured people, 3 of which were critical. The damage went to nearly 30 million CZK. I'm not sure though if it would qualify as the largest pile up, as it apparently was multiple different crashes all rolled in to one. It does however count as one of the largest if not the largest car accident in the history of Czech Republic.
I recall around 40 years ago a pile up on the New Jersey Turnpike, as it passed through the Meadowlands swamp, just outside of New York City, in which a sudden fog caused over a hundred vehicles to crash into one another. Tanker trucks with gas and oil and other chemicals burst into flames among the wreckage and there were multiple deaths. This occurred in the early morning hours and at the time there were no warnings given. I recall passing through this point a day later and seeing the larger vehicles and cars melted and looking like rusted out hulks. It was a terrible situation.
There are quite a few of these in Colorado as well, with similar circumstances except delete the water. A narrow mountain pass with fog, no exits, no shoulder, and winding so it interrupts your line of sight creates quite similar conditions.
There was something similar on I-95 in Florida earlier this year too. Fog mixed with smoke from controlled burns in the middle of the night and caused a major pileup in the 0-0 visibility.
@@admiral_franz_von_hipper5436 in 2011 on the M5 motorway in England there was an awful pileup that happened at night and was caused by smoke drifting from a bonfire party. It was pretty horrific and makes me glad I still live where I was born and raised….the Scottish highlands in a tiny village far away from motorways. So many people drive far too fast for the conditions they’re in. They have no time to react and get to safety. Grim.
We Yanks have had some horrific pileups on freeways, but at least on a freeway if you can extricate yourself from your vehicle you can escape. Can't on a bridge! Must have been scary af.
I'm retired so "stupid o'clock" is no longer in my routine, but we all appreciate you, John, for going the extra kilometer for your videos 👏
Back in the 1960;s The M1 and M6 were opened in part and one foggy night a truck traveling north over the Manchester Ship canal hit a slower moving truck resulting in the steel sheets load moving forward and slicing the cab open. The driver died of his injuries, all the while just like the Sheppey bridge vehicles kept coming and smashing onto one another. I managed to pull over onto the soft shoulder as it was in those days, after the police arrived and closed the motorway, being nosey I walked forward and a group of drivers were shining torches over the bridge into the canal. Witness said they saw someone run the escape the crashing vehicles and had jumped over the wall maybe thinking it was a crash barrier. The bridge would have been the same height as the Sheppey Bridge and a fall front that height would most likely be fatal.
Later fog lights were fitted along the Motorway and consisted of a pair of car fog lights and a car battery, needless to say these did not last long as they were stolen.
You're right about the terror of a pile up with people going 70 and you can't escape your vehicle! Of course, we see lots of US snow and, in Central Calif, fog winter pile ups and you still, in the videos, see people casually walking around in the lanes of traffic, inspecting the damage to their cars as if they don't expect more vehicles to be hurtling toward their fragile human bodies at highway speeds. BTW, in Britain, they still go "the extra mile." lol
It was very fortunate there was no fire, the death toll would have been huge.
This amazing cooperation between John in the field and John in the studio is one of magnificent quality.
I grew up in central Michigan, and between the swamps, lakes, and rivers, fog is a huge problem. Many times visibility was reduced to the front bumper, and your only focal point was the sound of the gravel on the shoulder. It let you know where you were, and that provided a small margin in the event that someone crossed the centerline.
That is an absolutely terrifying and visceral depiction of your experience.
I live near lake Erie and have had to deal with thick night fog before, that gravel thing is something I'll have to remember
The fact that Michigan doesn't have any reflective paint markings on their roads is so stupid and dangerous, my mother's ranted about it a good amount of times
Cleared and reopened that very evening? Dang, that's actually really impressive.
I'm so used to everyone slowing down in foggy conditions, especially in areas with known blind spots like hills or curves, so I feel like I want to assume the fog was patchy enough to give drivers a false sense of security? Hopefully they weren't just that la-de-da to just go barreling through dense fog?
I swear if this happened in America, at least one person would have died from this, though.
Nobody wants to get stuck on or near sheerness.
The reasons for the poor road links to sheerness is because the locals have gills and don't need to use a bridge.
@Club Retro 😆
Russia is the planet's Florida so I just assume anything wild and irrational has or will happen in Russia. That whole country is Survival of the Luckiest.
@@luvondarox I have to assume by the photos that there was no damage to the road surface or the bridge, and at the vehicles are mostly intact, it should be a relatively simple affair. Extended closures often happen due to fatalities, damages to the road surface, badly destroyed vehicles, or a combination of the three.
It seems to have happened quite a lot in the US.....although not necessarily on bridges but involving for. Los Angeles being the biggest as far as I can see and involved 216 vehicles including motorbikes (the incident in this video involved 130 vehicles). Fortunatly no one was killed.
Actually the bridge was cleared of the wreckage by 3pm. pretty amazing considering the amount of vehicles involved.
There was a similar accident in Ft. Worth, Texas during some freezing weather. The freeway (dual carriageway, for you) had what is called as an express tollway in the center. It consists of two lanes with no shoulders. About 100+ vehicles smashed into each other due to a patch of ice on the road. This happened in February 2021.
Ah, yeah, I remember that now that you mention it. That was a heck of a freeze, too: "Freezing weather" is a bit of an understatement.
@@SupersuMC Yeah, definitely. We got hit by the same weather system on the east coast a few days later, and it's the only time I can remember feeling like the weather was bad enough to make driving unsafe at any speed.
(I live in Dallas.) Came here to comment this exact thing. That wreck was HORRIFIC. All those semis...NIGHTMARE FUEL.
You have to remember they NEVER pretreated the interstate nor did they make announcements until after visibility was less than two car lengths away. They only took action after the accident. There was a freezing advisory but never any notification to avoid the interstate.
In 2011 there was a pile up on A19 near Rostock, Germany. Huge Sandstorm- low visibility- 85 cars crashing- 30 cars on fire- caused 8 deaths- about 40 severely injured
and the woman 'causing' it, was charged with manslaughter
I remember a similar incident in my own country. A thick fog bank in the middle of a 130 km/h highway, one second you have clear vision, the next you can't see beyond your own cars hood. It ended in a bunch of fatalities too.
This guy makes his music alone, drives to the bridge itself to get video footage and just makes an astonishing one man show as usual with a ton of information - crazy.
Another incident, which at first look appears to be the complete opposite regarding the conditions, and yet ended up in a 'mass carambolage' (pile up) with even worse results:
In Germany on April 8th 2011, the Autobahn A19 near Rostock was suddenly attacked by a sandstorm that was so dense (the sight range probably being ten meters), and turned up so unexpectedly (located in a depression) that it caused a pile of 85 cars. One person who did not react in time, described it as 'a blanket laying itself on my windscreen/shield'.
This accident didn't turn out so well. Fires broke out, 17 cars were ablaze altogether with three trucks, one of them transporting hydrogen peroxide. Explosions happened, the fire brigade had a hard time to reach the fires and extinguish them. The fire killed eight drivers.
Even while the rescue teams were at work, the sandstorm kept on whipping sand and agrarian soil into the air, at a maximum speed of 100 km/h (something like 62 mph)
Later on some officials said, the farmers were at least partly responsible for the disaster, because they did nothing against the erosion that caused the uplift of the soil from their vast fields, and there were no hedges lining the border between the fields and the autobahn. Yet there haven't been any consequences so far...
Have been searching for a comment that comes up with the sandstorm
Denke mal dass das einfach nur in Deutschland seine Runden gemacht hat
The idea of a sandstorm in Germany of all places blows my mind.
At the time of this crash, I was living in the village of Iwade, just on the mainland side of the bridge. This all took place around a mile from my front door. I was on a day off that day and I remember watching Sky news live footage of the crash scene whilst watching the helicopter filming the scene from a position directly above my house. As a side note, in the November I happened to meet one of the relatives of the most seriously injured victim of the crash, who, at that point was still recovering in hospital. It was a miracle that no one was killed.
I live just a couple of miles from the crossing and use it regularly - after the crash the speed limit was reduced to 50mph and average speed cameras were installed, but the reduced speed limit only lasted a couple of years and was put back up to 70mph, presumably because the cameras remain to this day. However I see people exceeding 70mph regularly and I've never heard of a single person getting a ticket, so I assume they don't actually work, but I'm not willing to try to test that!
Not only are people still speeding on it, you still see plenty of cars without lights in weather that calls for it.
I read that the average speed clocked only reduced from something like 76 when it was a 70 limit, to 72 when it went down to a 50, so they gave up 🤦♂️
i live on the Island, was involved in the crash (thankfully no harm/damage) and can emphatically 100% report that people do/did get tickets, As a fleet manager I have processed the PCN's for the wayward drivers.....
@@roygudgeon1486 Cheers for the info Roy. Good thing I watched my speed!
This world is rapidly passing away and I hope that you repent and take time to change before all out disaster occurs! Belief in messiah alone is not enough to grant you salvation - Matthew 7:21-23, John 3:3, John 3:36 (ESV is the best translation for John 3:36) if you believed in Messiah you would be following His commands as best as you could. If you are not a follower of Messiah I would highly recommend becoming one. Call on the name of Jesus and pray for Him to intervene in your life - Revelation 3:20.
Contemplate how the Roman Empire fulfilled the role of the beast from the sea in Revelation 13 over the course of 1260+ years. Revelation 17 confirms that the beast is in fact Rome. From this we can conclude that A) Jesus is the Son of God and can predict the future or make it happen, B) The world leaders/nations/governments etc have been conspiring together for the last 3000+ years going back to Babylon and before, C) History as we know it is fake. You don't really need to speculate once you start a relationship with God.
Can't get a response from God? Fasting can help increase your perception and prayer can help initiate events. God will ignore you if your prayer does not align with His purpose (James 4:3) or if you are approaching Him when "unclean" (Isaiah 1:15, Isaiah 59:2, Micah 3:4). Stop eating food sacrificed to idols (McDonald's, Wendy's etc) stop glorifying yourself on social media or making other images of yourself (Second Commandment), stop gossiping about other people, stop watching obscene content etc. Have a blessed day!
Considering the times this bridge was built which would make sense in the 40s or 50s...this bridge is absolutely insane. Bare bones...70 miles an hour, gradient alone with no place to pull over? I'm surprised no one has died yet.
I know right slow bridge traffic to 35 mph max
Only 40,000 people live on the Isle of Sheppey so cost was a major factor in construction.
@@WindTurbineSyndrome 35 mph!?! Do you drive a mobility scooter? If anyone is that scared, take the train.
And no lights??
People have died. Not in this accident, I grant you, but I've been on the other carriageway of an accident that resulted in a dead body lying in the middle of the roadway having been flung from her car after hitting a stationary vehicle that wasn't visible due to the slope of the bridge.
its been an absolute pleasure watching this channel grow from humble beginnings to what it is today
1997 M42 crash had 160 cars in it and 3 deaths all by driving too fast into fog. Perhaps do one on that too?
Great video John. Reminds me of a few very bad winter pileups we had in Michigan on I 94 on the similar scale. Glad that no one was killed in bridge Sheppey Bridge pileup.
On a much, much smaller scale, had to respond as an emergency services volunteer for traffic control to shut down iced-over bridges in my town. In one case there was a multiple vehicle crash on top of one bridge before it was closed. The State highway department salt trucks had to drive backwards and salt in front of themselves to get up the bridge; fire/rescue personnel at one point used rope lines tied to the guardrails to climb up the bridge on the walkways until the salt trucks arrived and started clearing the black ice off everything (!).
The main reason why no-one was killed in that crash was because of a quick-thinking lorry driver who used his lorry to intentionally block off the entrance to the bridge, preventing more cars from coming on before emergency services got there.
So what would have happened that day if it weren’t for that lorry driver blocking the entrance to the bridge? I believe what would have happened is that there would have been at least _some_ fatalities since people likely would have been killed in that pile-up if the entrance to the bridge hadn’t been blocked off.
this is the most positive and uplifting video you've ever uploaded
and he went to SHEPPEY
I tend to watch these videos when I’m going to sleep, and the posting time is always at night for me, it’s such a perfect day to wrap up my day.
This makes me think of the I35W pile up in Fort Worth, TX in February 2021. That was due to ice instead of fog, but a lot of the same factors were in play. The rest of I35W had been treated properly for ice, so everyone assumed it was safe to go at full highway speed. A turn and an incline on the roadway made it impossible for drivers to see the icy spot until they were right on it. So cars and trucks (what you would call lorries) just kept piling into each other. Six people died in this accident.
Sounds a bit like one video I saw. The guy got out of his car and up an incline on the side of the road. Filmed their car and then watched more drivers with less understanding about get plowed under by skidding cars when they got out to look at their cars for damage and were at the back end of the pileup.
Over 2 and a half hours driving for a few seconds of video, that's dedication. Thanks John, I'm going back over previous videos and have enjoyed your content for quite some time now. I really hope your channel continues to become more successful. Wow, 😎☀️👍
That commitment is so impressive, to go where no one else voluntarily goes. The pile up is just people desperate to escape. I had to comment for the TH-cam algorithm, just to reward that dedication.
Not surprised they cleared it fast, North Kent is the spiritual home of industrial estates and tow tucks!
Amazed this doesn't happen more often in the UK, as fog can get pretty bad here in many areas.
Very true
Half the population also see the speed limit as a minimum not a maximum, then they tail gate the other half. A good way to spot these fools is the make of there car, German and they probably don't even bother to indicate.
Oh boy fog lights.
I remember being in moderate fog when I was a kid "Shouldn't the fog light be turned on"
"No! That's a great way to get a fine, visibility has to be under a certain amount"
I still do not know what that certain amount is, however I do know that I'm never using my fog lights.
Knowing the police here visibility could be 1cm and they would see no fog.
Here in Finland it's also illegal to use fog lights if there's no reason, but any amount of visible fog is enough to justify their use. Also allowed in all conditions with limited visibility, like heavy rain or snowing or just dusty conditions. Also you generally just get verbal warning if you are caught driving with fog lights on without acceptable purpose if you have good explanation.
Or you could just stop listening to people who are stupid enough not to turn on their fog lights in actual fog.
@@Taladar2003 Define fog.
Now define fog while you have a chip on your shoulder and the power to issue someone with a nice big fine and points on their licence.
If you need more explanation, if you have your fog lights on and an officer "can't see any fog" or simply doesn't think it impairs vision enough to warrant fog lights (which is a nice big subjective grey area) you need to prove, in court that your use of fog lights was warranted.
Essentially you can drive with your fog lights on and risk a fine/weeks of applications and probably hundreds of pounds to get your day in court.
Or you can drive with your fog lights off and not risk any of that inconvenience.
@@daviddavidson2357 I mean, personally I just judge by whether a) I'm having trouble seeing as well as I'd typically expect with my normal headlights, and b) whether having the fog lights on makes the visibility significantly better. If both are true, I figure using my fog lights will increase my chances of getting home safely, and no fine in the world is worth risking life or limb to avoid.
@@MeadowMonkeyMyers Unless you live in a rural area where interacting with the police on a personal basis and knowing them outside of work hours is common, having them simply pull you over can be risking life or limb, literally.
For example a man got flagged on an ANPR as benefits overpaid him.
He was pulled over, dragged out of the car and the police split the bone in his shin vertically, top to bottom with a baton.
No charges filed against the officers though one did resign after a sex offence.
I think crimebodge covers it, he's been censored into oblivion but still has a channel, also a website with a lot of his older content.
This is quickly becoming one of my favourite channels, thanks for these videos!
This road is part of my commute to work to and from Sheerness Docks. Luckily I was working elsewhere that day but I know of a work colleague at the time who missed the crash by 5 Minutes. I actually drove on that same stretch of road a little later in the day.. Even now when that road hits fog I remember what once happened.. Good stuff.
Here's at least a partial defense (yes, I'm an American) of the drivers on that bridge:
If you're in thick fog and drivers around you are traveling 70 mph you might just think "if I slow down, someone will run into me." Those drivers had no perfect solution.
That's what i thought. My instructor specifically told me not to suddenly alter speed in fog. He told me to maintain speed to prevent the car behind me having to alter speed unexpectedly. If the people stopped, they'd have guaranteed a crash into the back of them. So they carried on until they couldn't see and hit the pile up. There was no way to prevent this with how we are taught to drive.
@@ElliottParkinson Predictability is definitely an underappreciated part of good driving
You can also tap your brakes lightly for a moment before any major slowdown, to basically flash your brake lights so that the person behind you knows to pay extra attention for any changes in speed. (The key word is "lightly" - you're not trying to actually slow down at that point, since brake checking doesn't help anyone. You just want the lights to illuminate for a quick second.) Doesn't help with emergency braking situations, but it's a nice tool to have in your back pocket for times when you know you're going to need to slow down, but also have a Nascar wannabe riding your trunk.
In New Zealand State Highway 29 over the Kaimai Ranges summits at around 490m (1600ft), It's notorious for poor visibility due to fog, low cloud and heavy rain, to help reduce the number of crashes, they installed weather activated speed limit signs, that can reduce the speed limit from 100km/h down to as low as 20Km/h in extreme weather. The system is powered by small wind turbines and solar panels, and has automated weather stations at key points on the mountain these in turn control LED speed signs. But you still get idiots that ignore the signs and speed in bad weather.
Man I know it's a saturday when I get you in my feed. Thanks for the consistently great content and regular uploads!
I was looking forward to this video ever since you mentioned it in one of your previous videos.
I teach driving for a living, and I can tell you the main reason for this is that humans don't naturally travel above about 25kph/15mph. We're not wired for that, but we *are* wired for running, and not tripping over. So, naturally when moving, we look at the ground 8-10 meters ahead... And often where our awareness ends. Being a safe driver involves habitually rewiring that instinct, and it takes years of discipline to do. It's human nature to have rear enders.
Also paying attention to everyone else is key to avoiding accidents and that means people six or seven cars ahead if it's busy. The amount of times I'll go "I don't like how that guy up there is driving" and other people in the car will be like "who what?." The guy switching lanes every other car to get there slightly faster. I've avoided two crashes by not being in the same lanes as idiots.
This is the old myth that came up when the railroad was invented. People are adaptable and if they aren't they usually don't get a license. Who only look 10 meters ahead? That's a disaster waiting to happen. That's less than one second on US interstates (80 MPH/125kmph). If you're a decent driver, especially in congested areas, you're constantly monitoring the traffic as far ahead as you can see and preparing for what is eventually going to happen while keeping an eye on what's going on in your immediate surroundings. It doesn't take years, it takes knowing that danger can come from anywhere. If you've ever ridden a motorbike you find out that no one can see you and they probably won't notice when they do.
That's a pack of nonsense. You can't even show a single source for it.
Contrarily, many animals will notice you from very far away, horses being one. Voila, the 'we naturally stare at the floor' narrative is already dead with that knockout blow; species without cars also look way far ahead.
@@nvelsen1975 horses travel pretty much at car speeds and have adapted vision to match. Your knockout blow improves my argument, son
@@adamneeves21
If your plan was to say you're a city boi who's never ridden before, then your plan has worked.
I remember this being on the news! To this day, my mum hates driving over the Sheppey bridge- I don't blame her. We'd literally driven over it about a day before this happened.
Really informative. Thanks for posting. I remember this playing out on the radio news all day.
I feel I must thank you at least, for the fun I get while watching your videos mid day. and for the sound slumber I get when I replay the videos to make me sleep.
Thank you!
Using your videos for sleeping helps me cope with moving alone (from a toxic family).
I love my rear fog lights on my land rovers, no one really knows about them here in the US, but they’re very useful in fog and snow. I was actually following a friend in another rover to a ski resort in heavy snow and called him to ask that he turn them on - I literally couldn’t see his vehicle till he did so (and I had to know how much stopping distance I had.)
I’m kinda shocked that bridge has no status / warning signs along with cameras to monitor traffic - I thought the UK had a hard on for CCTV cameras lol.
In Australia, there are sections of road/highway that have variable speed limits. For example, it might be 110km/h under normal conditions and 90km/h when raining. There are rain detectors and LED speed limit signs which will display the correct speed limit depending on the road conditions at the time. It might be a good idea for this bridge.
Or 40 km/hr for road works with no workers in site
@@Kni0002 omg, that is so annoying. Especially when you go by every day and none has been working for days and the road works are not affecting the road conditions or original layout.
Same for Europe
This world is rapidly passing away and I hope that you repent and take time to change before all out disaster occurs! Belief in messiah alone is not enough to grant you salvation - Matthew 7:21-23, John 3:3, John 3:36 (ESV is the best translation for John 3:36) if you believed in Messiah you would be following His commands as best as you could. If you are not a follower of Messiah I would highly recommend becoming one. Call on the name of Jesus and pray for Him to intervene in your life - Revelation 3:20.
Contemplate how the Roman Empire fulfilled the role of the beast from the sea in Revelation 13 over the course of 1260+ years. Revelation 17 confirms that the beast is in fact Rome. From this we can conclude that A) Jesus is the Son of God and can predict the future or make it happen, B) The world leaders/nations/governments etc have been conspiring together for the last 3000+ years going back to Babylon and before, C) History as we know it is fake. You don't really need to speculate once you start a relationship with God.
Can't get a response from God? Fasting can help increase your perception and prayer can help initiate events. God will ignore you if your prayer does not align with His purpose (James 4:3) or if you are approaching Him when "unclean" (Isaiah 1:15, Isaiah 59:2, Micah 3:4). Stop eating food sacrificed to idols (McDonald's, Wendy's etc) stop glorifying yourself on social media or making other images of yourself (Second Commandment), stop gossiping about other people, stop watching obscene content etc. Have a blessed day!
Excellent video with all stages well explained. Here in California we have fog in the Central Valley which can suddenly descend, so that hundreds of cars driving 70mph in bright sunlight are instantly in zero-visibility fog. Here in Greater Los Angeles we did have a 198-car pileup due to our ordinary fog coming in from the sea, like the Sheppey disaster everyone was driving too fast, and somehow no-one was killed.
I want to thank you so very much for creating this informative content for us to enjoy. I want to come to the UK and just shake your hand. My favorite TH-cam channel.
Hey John, love the channel. I'd really be interested in hearing your treatment of the collapse of the Cyprus Viaduct during the Loma Prieta Earthquake which struck the San Francisco bay area in 1989. I I lived in the region at the time of the earthquake, and I'd be very interested in hearing your insights into the failure of the viaduct.
I've rarely been in fog this thick, but being Canadian, I have been in snow blowing so thick that I was down to 30 k/mh (about 20 mph) on a main highway. It seems self evident that you should slow down when visibility reduces.
Lived in the area most of my life know the area well and it is amazing to watch fog roll in in seconds! I was watching one day bright sunshine then I noticed a line of fog a mile or so away it took only a couple of minutes to cover that distance! Then ten minutes later brilliant sunshine. I also noticed crashes on the M25 always seem to happen near bridges that go over the motorway near a corner. I spent years watching this and if you look on the southern section you will lots a skid marks near these black spots. It's due to the fact you can't see traffic untill you are almost at the bridge. I used to hang back a bit in these areas to avoid getting involved. Thanks for the video and your time.
My mom was in the middle of a huge freeway pileup in San Diego in the mid 70's. (It was raining and that's a rare and very bad thing in SD) She got whiplash and still suffers back pain to this day. She was in a Vega and it was totaled, completely smashed front and back.
Not having a shoulder is so irresponsible, especially on a heavily travelled freeway... 😳🤯
And our stupid Government let the Highways Agency change many if our motorways (3 lanes and a hard shoulder) to so called 'smart motorways' where, during congested periods, the hard shoulder is converted into a running lane.
@@DraigBlackCat and worse than that are the ones they call 'managed mototways' or whatever buzzword it is today, where there is no no hard shoulder at all and you have to remember to only break down or get a flat tyre every two miles...
There is nothing smart about smart motorways.
This world is rapidly passing away and I hope that you repent and take time to change before all out disaster occurs! Belief in messiah alone is not enough to grant you salvation - Matthew 7:21-23, John 3:3, John 3:36 (ESV is the best translation for John 3:36) if you believed in Messiah you would be following His commands as best as you could. If you are not a follower of Messiah I would highly recommend becoming one. Call on the name of Jesus and pray for Him to intervene in your life - Revelation 3:20.
Contemplate how the Roman Empire fulfilled the role of the beast from the sea in Revelation 13 over the course of 1260+ years. Revelation 17 confirms that the beast is in fact Rome. From this we can conclude that A) Jesus is the Son of God and can predict the future or make it happen, B) The world leaders/nations/governments etc have been conspiring together for the last 3000+ years going back to Babylon and before, C) History as we know it is fake. You don't really need to speculate once you start a relationship with God.
Can't get a response from God? Fasting can help increase your perception and prayer can help initiate events. God will ignore you if your prayer does not align with His purpose (James 4:3) or if you are approaching Him when "unclean" (Isaiah 1:15, Isaiah 59:2, Micah 3:4). Stop eating food sacrificed to idols (McDonald's, Wendy's etc) stop glorifying yourself on social media or making other images of yourself (Second Commandment), stop gossiping about other people, stop watching obscene content etc. Have a blessed day!
Twice in my life I have been right behind a pileup on a high speed highway as it started in front of me. Miraculously both times I was able to weave my way through it at 70+ mph while shitting my pants. It was mostly just pure luck. But when I'm on the highway now I give a lot of space to the car in front of me and hate being tailgated. Hopefully it never happens again.
When being tailgated, just slow down, they will quickly get bored and overtake.
Wow… my favourite youtuber was 30 minutes away from me and i had no idea 😳😳 great video!
Yea! Field trip! On a more serious note. Researchers (ironically in the UK) found that heavy fog interfered with a driver's spatial awareness, causing them to believe they were traveling far slower than they actually were. The information was basically round-filed except for those of left dealing with the mess at the end. So, if'n you're in heavy fog or low visibility be more mindful of your speed and check your speedometer, and trust it more than what you feel. Stay safe.
I always use my fog lights when it's foggy.
If you don’t know the operational controls of your vehicle and/or don’t know appropriate use, you are automatically a hazard on road. The fog light indicator in the instrument cluster is also VERY distinct and is fairly bright.
This same incident can happen in heavy snowfall, which I’m very used to drive in. People are also dumb to keep their high-beams on during fog/snow which would further reduce visibility due to most light getting reflected back. And of course reducing the speed by around 25-30%, as you don’t want to slow too much in case of idiots not slowing down.
I took a group of men with learning difficulties on Holiday there back in in 1988, there was holiday camp there then! We actually had a good time lol.. I had never heard of this accident, Thank you for your video.
great video, and great opening! thanks for your work
Have they tried driving on the correct side of the road? Maybe that would help!
Why would changing the side of the road we drive on fix anything about this?
@@amyshaw893 it was a joke…
Yes! Also, have they tried mph? 55 sounds much safer than 80-100 km/hr
@@amyshaw893 go home and practice saying 'aluminum' properly.
@@amyshaw893 Matthew "Mr. Literal" Shaw strikes again! 😆
Don't worry, Mr. Literal was my nickname for years... Until I was diagnosed with Asperger's in my 40's.
I've never been in a pile up, thankfully, the closest I came was a trip to work were a misting rain turned into a nightmare when the tempeture dropped below freezing. Not realizing what was going on I was concerned that my car was starting to have steering issues, I decided to pull over and see if I could figure out what was going on. I damn near went on my butt as soon as I got out.
I decided to wait for a salt truck, it eventually came down the road, sideways. They got it sorted out and I followed the salt truck to a crossroads and decided to call it a day, so I waited for another salt truck going the way I needed to go.
As I was getting close to home there was a spot that ran along a river with a sharp curve at the bottom of a small steep hill. There was a dinner right before the hill and thankfully I noticed a bunch of people standing in the parking lot. So I pulled over and got out.
Turned out that this hill was just over the county line and the northern county hadn't salted this far yet and the hill was a sheet of glass, I watched three seperate cars go down that hilll and about five seconds later heard, 'CRUNCH'.
Thankfull there was a pull off their so when the salt truck finally arrived we didn't have to wait for them to clear the road, but there were still 6 or 8 vehicles there when I finally was able to go by.
It is surreal experiance something like this, watching a car go by, knowing that driver is about to have their whole day ruined.
Thank you for sharing this experience, its is very informative for other drivers (myself included) - I live in a region of Greece where that kind of weather conditions are practically impossible, but it is very important to have a reality check of what could possibly happen, since northern Greece (and especially the more mountainous regions) have a much higher probability of that happening and once in a while I do go on various road trips involving that potential hazard. Really glad to hear you were able to avoid all this and were safe and sound exercising such logical and high caution. Take care!
Honestly I only stick to my recommended tab anymore (I still sub to people for the algorithm) and I've watched TONS of PDs videos through that but this was the first video I've been within a day of it's release. And just this intro idk made me think it was very recent for some reason 😂 the dedication John. Truly appreciate all of your videos 😌
I’ve been watching your videos for 3 years and every time you drop a video, I know it’s a quality video. Even when you branched out to other topics
Thank you
@@PlainlyDifficult your welcome sir
What kind of insane illogic is required for a tunnel to have less impact on wildlife than an overground bridge?
Some places have safety laws that prohibit tunneling and instead require above-ground digging.
Maybe they polled the local earthworms 🪱
It has a nature reserve right next door for one thing, but the most important bit: tunnelling through marshlands is generally not the best solution from a geologic point of view.
Just look at a map of the area (Google Maps has Terrain view).
Great video John! It never fails to amaze me just how stupid and clueless the majority of motorists are with zero anticipation or care, especially in adverse weather. No sympathy for any of those involved as they were all clearly going too fast for the bad conditions hence why so many crashed. I’d have fined them and you can guarantee not many turned up for the driver’s awareness
Thank you
I disagree. All of them going too fast? Not necessarily. Even if you're driving slowly and watching the road and being careful, a careless driver going too fast can come up behind you in the fog and smash into you. The best thing to do is stay at home if at all possible, wait for the fog to lift, and take an alternate route that has more visibility.
California's central valley used to have lots of pile ups due to fog causing zero visibility. In 1992 there was a 99 car pileup on hwy 99. Not as much fog nowadays due to drying up wetlands and pumping the water to los angels.
This reminded me of an incident that happened on Dec 11, 1990 on interstate 75 just north of Chattanooga, TN. It was in the early morning and there was a very dense fog. Difference is that this huge pile had several deaths.
When my father started teaching me how to drive, the first thing he did was hand me a bottle of Windex and a roll of paper towels. He instructed me to clean the windshield, inside and out. He said "If you can't see, you can drive." This has stuck with me for for more than 27 years. Due to this, there is an absolute 0 chance I could ever be so much as involved in wreck like this. If I couldn't see, I would just not drive. And if conditions became such that I could not see while I was already driving, I would pull over and park; because if I can't see, I can't drive.
Ah but the bridge was built with no refuge lane and the fog wasn't down at the usual road level. You only couldn't see once you got up there with no warning there would be fog up ahead and no opportunity to safely pull over when you discover the fog up on the bridge!
I understand a 50mph speed limit was put in place, but then taken off again. Thick fog can occur anywhere now and again, so using that logic, all roads in the UK would have to have a speed limit of 50mph or lower. Plus, the Sheppey Crossing is built to modern engineering standards, unlike thousands of miles of other dual carraiegways in the UK which aren't, but also have a 70mph speed limit.
Was it built to modern engineering standards though? No lights? No warning signals? No way to get off the road as a pedestrian (former car driver who crashed/whose vehicle broke down)? For that matter no foot or bike paths of any kind? Even in 2006 it would have been relatively trivial to put in a system that alerts drivers of stationary vehicles ahead (e.g. based on the same sensor technology used for traffic lights for decades).
@@Taladar2003 If the standard would be to put all that in place for all new high speed dual carriageways, they'd end up so expensive that hardly any would ever get built. So drivers would be stuck with using old narrow, windy roads which would be substantially more dangerous.
Pedestrians & cyclists can get on and off the island via the old Kinsferry Bridge underneath
Repent and follow Jesus my friend! Repenting doesn't mean confessing your sins to others, but to stop doing them altogether. Belief in Messiah alone is not enough to get you into heaven - Matthew 7:21-23, John 3:3, John 3:36 (ESV is the best translation for John 3:36). Contemplate how the Roman empire fulfilled the role of the beast from the sea in Revelation 13. Revelation 17 confirms that it is in fact Rome. From this we can conclude that A) Jesus is the Son of God and can predict the future or make it happen, B) The world leaders/nations/governments etc have been conspiring together for the last 3000+ years to accomplish the religion of the Israelites C) History as we know it is fake. You don't really need to speculate though because you can start a relationship with God and have proof. Call on the name of Jesus and pray for Him to intervene in your life. - Revelation 3:20
Revelation 6 1st Seal: White horse = Roman Empire conquering nations under Trajan 98-117 AD & Gospel spreading rapidly. 2nd Seal: Red horse, bloody civil wars with 32 different Emperors, most killed by the sword. 185-284 AD 3rd Seal: Black horse, economic despair from high taxes to pay for wars, farmers stopped growing. 200-250 AD 4th Seal: Pale horse, 1/4th of Romans died from famine, pestilence; at one point 5,000 dying per day. 250-300 AD 5th Seal: Diocletian persecuted Smyrna church era saints for ten years, blood crying out for vengeance. 303-312 AD 6th Seal: Political upheaval in the declining Roman Empire while the leaders battled each other. 313-395 AD
Revelation 7 Sealing of 144,000, the saints, before trumpet war judgments, which led to the fall of the Roman Empire.
Revelation 8 1st Trumpet: Alaric and the Goths attacked from the north, the path of hail, and set it on fire. 400-410 AD 2nd Trumpet: Genseric and the Vandals attacked the seas and coastlands, the blood of sailors in water. 425-470 AD 3rd Trumpet: Attila and the Huns scourged the Danube, Rhine & Po rivers area, dead bodies made water bitter. 451 AD 4th Trumpet: Odoacer and the Heruli caused the last Western Emperor (sun), Senate (moon) to lose power. 476 AD With the Western Roman Emperor (restrainer of 2 Thes. 2) removed; the son of perdition Popes took power.
Revelation 9 Two woe judgments against the central 1/3rd and eastern 1/3rd of the Roman Empire. 612-1453 AD 5th Trumpet: Locust & scorpions point to Arabia, the rise of the Muslim army. Islam hides Gospel from Arabs. 612-762 AD 6th Trumpet: Turks released to attack Constantinople with large cannons (fire, smoke, brimstone). 1062-1453 AD
Revelation 10 The little book is the printed Bible, which was needed after the Dark Ages when Scriptures were banned by Popes.
Revelation 11 7th Trumpet: Martin Luther measured Roman Church; found that it’s an apostate church, not part of true temple. The two witnesses are the Scriptures and saints who proclaim the pure Gospel and testify against the antichrist Popes. Papal Church pronounced Christendom dead in 1514 AD. Silence for 3.5 years. Then Luther posted his 95 Thesis, which sparked the Protestant Reformation and brought the witnesses back to life. Millions of Catholics were saved.
Revelation 12 Satan used the Roman Empire to try to wipe out the early Church, Satan was cast down as the Empire collapsed.
Revelation 13 The antichrist beast Popes reigned in power 1,260 years, 538-1798, is the little horn of Daniel 7, son of perdition. The false prophet Jesuit Superior General rose to power from land (earth) of Vatican and has created many deceptions.
Revelation 14 Points to great harvest during the Protestant Reformation & wrath on Catholic countries who obey antichrist Pope.
Revelation 15 Overcoming saints victorious over the beast. Prelude to 7 vials and judgment on those who support Papal Rome.
Revelation 16 1st Vial: The foul sore of atheism was poured out on Catholic France, leaving them with no hope, led to revolution. 2nd Vial: The French Revolution started in 1793, killed 250,000, as France had obeyed the Pope and killed saints. 3rd Vial: The French Revolution spread to rural areas of France, where Protestants had been killed in river areas. 4th Vial: The bloody Napoleonic wars shed the blood of countries who had revered and obeyed the antichrist Pope. 5th Vial: Judgment on the seat of the beast. Papal States invaded in 1798, Pope imprisoned, removed from power. 6th Vial: The Turks vast domain dried up, they were only left with Turkey. They lost control of Palestine in 1917 AD, Israel became a nation again in 1948
It's raining in the UK........shocker.
Thanks for getting up early to make this vid 👍
Thank you for excellent coverage of this disaster.
Let John know he did great work with that bridge shot, I can’t wait to see him back on the channel! You better treat him well, John
What’s up John! Keep up the great work!
Another great video. Thank you for all the hard work.
I really love this channel. The narrator is so funny. I love his dry humour. The accent is so soothing.
I'm so accustomed to you covering rail disasters where signals were involved that I kept waiting for some discussion of signals. I'm surprised that they don't put some kind of signal on this kind of bridge. Flashing yellow would alert people that conditions ahead were hazardous. Flashing red would alert people of stoppage ahead due to some kind of problem.
Wow, thanks for the awesome dedication to get up and go to the actual place of the disaster. Thanks for your amazing and informative videos!!!
its less than an hour for him!
stuff like this really makes me worry about the "upgrade" of motorways here in the uk to smart motorways without a hard shoulder. all it would take is a slight fault with 1 car to cause a pileup because theres nowhere to pull over, especially being as Nobody does the actual speed limit on the motorway anyway. plus, what about emergency vehicle access ?? how much are response times to motorway accidents going to be increased by ambulances and fire crews having to navigate their way through miles of traffic caused by the incident ??
fantastic video, as always :] im on a binge rn and am Loving it; the tone of ur videos is fun enough to hold my interest for hours at this point without being inappropriate giving the gravity of the situations u cover, plus they give so much information on how stuff came to be and i love all the editing, notes and animations
I love this channel mostly for the fact that I really like the accent of the guy in this video he just sounds very posh and British keep up the good work my friend !
Would’ve never heard about this being from the US, but it’s always been a concern of mine when going over any bridge. Thanks PD for the video, was interesting to hear about!
The rear fog light is a great idea. Driving in fog scares the crap out of me. It was nice to have a video with no deaths!
better than the much-maligned people that put on their blinkers in heavy rain?
When I hear your intro music, I get all tingly!
Really enjoying that new end music you used :)
Thank you
This is very fortunate. I work for the NHS in admin and one of our IT managers is a former paramedic. He attended a really bad crash on the M4 30 years ago and saw things no-one should ever have to see. Thank goodness there was no fire.
This one brings to mind our very own 130-car pileup we had here in Wisconsin on the I-41 back in 2019.
I do appreciate the decision to educate drivers after the accident. Whether or not you pursue the drivers for traffic infractions, it's that education that stands the best chance of helping drivers prevent another such incident in the future.
AT the cost of loss of revenue for parasites like local governments and scamming private companies feeding off the gov's desire to rob people.
@@jayjaynella4539 I mean, they make more money off speeding tickets than accidents (fewer expenses), so you would think even the most self-interested, greediest, and deeply corrupt officials would still embrace it, but apparently that's communism or something
This bridge is horribly unsafe - needs a shoulder, adequate lighting, and warnings and CCTV on approach to make sure people are not driving too fast. As always great video John.