You find yourself at a low bridge - now what?

Whatever you do.
PLEASE be smarter than a coworker of mine who on Friday, ran under a low bridge, and found out that it wasn't tall enough.
It was VERY clearly marked LOW CLEARANCE.
He still has a job.

 

Not dumb at all Hurst. You gotta be EXTRA careful when you are tired!

 

Cleveland, IIRC. Delivering to Family Dollar stores, didn't have my truck GPS yet. Qualcomm routed me under a bridge, to get to it there was a tight LH turn between brick buildings, then an S-curve before you can even see the bridge. It wasn't marked, looked a little low, but I thought I'd clear it. Crept up to it, and rode the clutch in 1st at idle. Tink! Nope! Backed out to the side of the road, called 911, they blocked the intersection for me to get out. Oh, and I was backing through the S-curve, to a tee in the road. Good times.

 

Yeah but ya cant help but feel pretty dumb when the trooper say thats not for the bridge. The way the sign was positioned it looked like the bridge had a 10 ton weight limit. Instead it was for a no trucks over 10 tons within town limits.

Trooper told me most truckers ignore those signs anyway. I'm thinking to myself,.. Well most are company drivers who really dont care. Plus I pride myself on having a clean record.

I have heard of a few towns in PA that will pull over trucks and impound them for ignoring signs like that.

Hurst

 

call the police......no harm, no foul

 

I've thankfully never had to back out from bridges but I have gotten somewhat stuck on a residential road that I wasn't supposed to be on (technically). My story happened in the middle of the night (of course).

I think it was in Ohio or Penn trying to get to a customer out in the boondocks. The GPS and Qualcolm routed me on some residential streets. I knew it wasn't right so I pulled over and looked at my Google Maps. Sure enough thats the only route in town to get in to where the customer's facility is. Okay here I go! Got to an EXTREMELY TIGHT right turn. Hmm... I could use a spotter about now. Neighborhood is asleep, don't #### it up and wake up a bunch of pissed off people with cameras! I called the police. Couple of County Sherriff's Deputies came up laughing at me. "What are you doing here?". I told them that was the only way to the customer from the direction I came from (which I don't remember). They agreed. They never had anyone try to come through that way. They agreed to spot me, and I made the turn LIKE A BOSS! Felt proud of myself and vowed to go all the way around next time so I wouldn't have to do this again.

Edit: That was 2 months into my solo career

 

Most bridges are measured from their lowest point. If the bridge is on a incline, you can go to the high side and sometimes make it trough. There is a local arch bridge that is posted 11', you can take a 13'6" load under it if you go through the middle of the arch because the measurement is at the lowest part of the arch.

Closest I've been is hauling a excavator under a low bridge. Dropped the air, let the neck down (RGN) and still rubbed the hyd hoses on top of the excavator boom. I had a guy watching me and went through very slow.

 

Yep cost me $18.50 for directions through Manhattan

 

I would make sure I couldn't fit under it by inching forward and checking clearances.

There are numerous bridges and overpasses in NYC marked 12'8" etc that a 13'6" truck will easily fit under.

 

personally i'd say...FLOOR IT..!!

you can only get stuck once and you can only destroy everything once, so go for the gusto!

seriously, get out and look, back up if you can, SAFELY. otherwise, call the local PD, they should be able to stop traffic for you. now whether or not you get a butt chewing i can't say. whether or not they call your company on you, i cannot say, whether or not you get a ticket for whatever reason, i cannot say.

but i was always told, "if you're gonna mess up, do it right, as it makes the BS worth it"!