Flatbed driver dies stopping for fire truck, pipe load shifts crushing driver in cab

that's horrible... RIP driver. Cant imagine what his family is going through.

 

i can't tell from the pic if there was a headache rack.but then again depending on the factors of the crash it could be a rack might of not made a difference.

 

Looks like a wood bulkhead (or x-chain the front maybe) might have been helpful in this case, too. Steel sliding forward from just a hard braking application should not happen unless poor securement was at play.

 

Well, clearly, this is no time to admit whose fault this was, but a little common sense could have prevented this. A headache rack should have stopped this, and while I haven't done a lot of flatbed work, I've seen drivers that put extra chains around the front of the load, to prevent this from happening. While we always think of firefighters as heroes, which they are, especially today, being 9/11, a little common sense on the part of the driver of the fire engine, should have seen a loaded semi, and maybe waited before pulling out in front of them.

 

Prayers for this driver and their family

 

Nothing in the story indicating wether the truck was on call or not.

 

Hi snowwy, yep, 3rd paragraph, truck was responding to an emergency.
Well, that's flatbed for ya. Stuff has been flying off of flatbeds for years, one reason, I never did much flatbed.

 

Looks like the late driver might not have been paying attention since he overreacted when he saw the fire truck at the stop sign. He wanted to do the right thing and let the fire truck ahead of him but he panicked and paid the price. An experienced driver would have gassed on it to get out of the way ASAP.

My official opinion as an unqualified internet accident scene investigator.