Accidents Happen: Strange Things in the Road

The Driver CPC requirements implemented throughout the EU are intended to make sure HGV and PCV drivers are both competent and proficient. The idea is to reduce accidents and make the haulage and transport industries as efficient as possible through ongoing training and assessment. Yet not even the most stringent CPC driver training is 100% foolproof. Accidents still happen. And sometimes those accidents result in strange things being spilled across the road.

The BBC recently published an article discussing some of the stranger substances that have ended up on our roads after HGV accidents. The article was inspired by a crash that resulted in a motorway slip road being covered by 24 tonnes of lard. That must certainly have been one incredible mess to clean up.

Some of the other substances mentioned by the BBC were:

• Acid – The M11 near Stansted Airport was closed for more than 12 hours last year when an HGV overturned and spilled a combination of phosphoric acid and melamine formaldehyde resin across the roadway. Crews had to race against time to clean up the spill before the chemicals hardened.

• Cement – Last year was also the year that Highways England was faced with cleaning up tonnes of powdered concrete that ended up on the M6 between junctions 35 and 36. Making matters worse were extremely high summer temperatures that encouraged the concrete cure. Some sections of the road had to be resurfaced as a result.

• Chickens – Do you remember the accident last year involving the lorry carrying 6,800 chickens on the M62 in Manchester? Some 2,000 chickens escaped, and several hundred were killed in the accident.

• Blood and Sewage – A 2011 accident in Stoke-on-Trent resulted in a nasty spill combining animal blood and raw human sewage on the A3 near Guildford. How would you like to have been part of that cleaning crew?

• Salmon – Approximately 10 tonnes of salmon ended up spilled across M62 near Goole in 2013. This spill was bad enough that frozen fish were strewn across both carriageways. Crews worked for hours to get the mess cleaned up before rush-hour traffic.

• Yeast Extract – Perhaps the nastiest and most difficult spill to clean up involved 20 tonnes of yeast extract that covered portions of the M1 near Sheffield in 2011. It took 12 hours for crews to remove the sticky black mess and reopen the motorway.

This is just a small sampling of the interesting spills we have seen over the years. The good news is that most of the crashes involving these kinds of things do not result in any serious injuries. The bad news is that the crashes still cost money and manpower.

CPC driver training is intended to reduce the numbers of these kinds of accidents by making sure drivers are competent. The requirements are relatively new, but already we are seeing some improvement on UK motorways. Ongoing CPC driver training should only improve things.

Sources:

BBC – http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-34796853