I got a sobering reminder this evening about the hazards of the road. Like many of you, I rack up lots of miles each week and I will confess that I too often let my guard down and cruise along on auto-pilot, thinking about the job or the next project on my truck or whatever. This evening on my way home, I first came across several cars in the ditch. It appeared that a SUV towing another vehicle on a tow dolly somehow jack-knifed and ended up in the ditch with the left rear tire on top of the tongue of the tow dolly. It appeared to be part of a caravan of vehicles towing other vehicles south on I-35 so they already had another SUV unhooked and pulling the mess out of the ditch.

BTW, what is the deal with all these caravans of vehicles towing (towbar or dolly, never a trailer) another vehicle south thru Oklahoma? Are they auction cars headed for old Mexico?

Less than 10 miles further down the road I see the car next to me hit the brakes and a cloud rise up a 1/4 mile ahead of me and then a tire fly straight up in the air. When I get there, the road is covered with broken plastic and debris and a late-model mid-size car is slowing down on the shoulder with steam rolling out from under the hood and a huge dent in the left front of the hood where it hit a loose tire head on. The tire, after hitting the car, went 30+ feet up in the air and ended up in the center median. As I went by, it somewhat looked like a 15-16" trailer tire. I never did see where it came from but since I never did see a trailer ahead of me missing a tire, I surmise that it came from the on-coming traffic.

Needless to say, it was an abrupt reminder to watch out for all the unexpected things that may be headed your way.

For those of you pulling trailer this weekend, check those lug nuts and be safe out there. We want you back here on Monday.

 

Good idea.

I travel I80 several times a day. I cannot believe the crap people call trailers and how they secure stuff. I see matresses, chairs, furnature, boat cushions, lamps, ect. in the ditchs all the time. Heck, maybe Begle1 could furnish his 1 br appartment better!

If you are gonna tow anything do a walkaround and make sure every thing is secure.

 

Agreed!! I check all my lights, connections, tires and all that before I head out. Which at times is at quarter to 5 in the morning. I hate seeing trailers going down the road, no light on one side, tiny piece of red plastic on the other side and neither one working. How in the heck am I supposed to know what your doing? So you stay back as far as you can.

I was hit about two weeks ago because the lug nuts came off a guys lifted/big tired jeep. Left front wheel came off, went about 150 yards across the median, across oncoming traffic and into the bushes..his jeep ended up taking a hard right turn directly into the side of my trailer. My trailer fender blew his right front wheel and my forward axle tire. I say he was lucky I was there cause the skid mark where the tire came off is just about a 90 degee skid. So, I told him he was lucky he did not roll it....he thought he was going to roll. Don't worry though, SuperShawn was there to catch you!!! The Lord works in mysterious ways. Maybe I'm due a winning lottery ticket??

 

I was helping my sis-in-law move about 70 miles when she got married to my brother, and we used a friends 94 3500 CTD with a 12ft flatbed on it to put all her furniture on...well I thought I had everything tied down good, but about 10 miles down the road, I noticed an ottoman on the passenger side kinda wobbling in the wind, so I kept a close eye on it, thinking I would stop at the next rest stop and tie it down better...well no sooner had I thought that, and the thing went flying...luckily there was nobody else around..I simply said "woops there it goes" and she looked at me with a dumbfounded look, then looked back and went "WHAT!?!"
We got turned around, and went back to find the ottoman sitting on the shoulder upright without a scratch on it...it looked like it had been put there for someone to sit on! Im just glad nobody was behind us..that coulda caused a lot of problems if it landed on a windshield...

 

They are mexicans who have been buying up every cheap car, minivan,or suv, in Iowa, MN, to take back to Mexico to sell.,NO LIE!!!, Had 3 diferent groups within a 3 week period stop to look at my 96 dodge grand caravan with high miles for $900 on thier way thru with about 4 or 5 vehicles, some on tow dollies claiming they were way back to Mexico with thier newly purchased vehicles, and wanted to buy it, but claimed they didnt have $900 only $700, or $600,{funny on how that lie only sounded real with the first group} so I told them, you come back when you get $900 and you can take it back with you!, they never came back!lol

 

Yep! You got it...
I understand that older cars are not taxed anything near like newer cars are when they are brought into Mexico.. Hence the demand for those older cars.(Mexstan could probably tell us more details)
Plus, older cars are more repairable than these newer "computers with four wheels". There is apparently quite an industry down there for serving these older cars part and repair needs..

Insurance "buybacks" get sent south of the border too.. Our wrecked minivan got fixed by the insurance Co. The van looked GOOD, but upon inspection, they didn't approve the unibody work.. Buyback time... Off to Mexico it went...They don't even want those unsafe vehicles anywhere in the States...

Those long CAR-avans are regular sights along Hwy77 headed to the border. Occasionally you'll see one left on the side of the road that apparently blew and they couldn't even tow it or maybe they just don't want it anymore because it got trashed..

K.

 

On thursday I saw a 25-30' boat (Cabin cruiser type) sitting crossways on I-80 and not on the trailer. This was at the Little America exit 68 or something. It WAS being towed by a Durango (but it's got a hemi).

 

I once came up on a car with a wheel off a 5 axle dump truck wedged nicely in the passenger side of the windshield...... Sheriff was at the truck driver.