Semi flies over 100 feet into Temple Hotel

[txfireguy2003]

I logged on tonight as usual to read a few posts and hopefully learn something, and as usual, I did. However, I half way expected to see a posting about the wreck that occurred this morning in Temple, as it has truly been the talk of Central Texas from what I can tell.

About 0830 this morning, an 18 wheeler full of auto parts running out of Laredo and headed to Mississippi left north bound I-35, crossed the access road, about 500 feet across an empty parking lot, across a sloped concrete retaining wall, then litterally FLEW 100+ feet, impacting the second story of the Temple Residence Inn, which is a really nice, new Marriott facility. The tractor totally destroyed the second floor room that it hit, as well as the first floor room below, the hallway and the room across the hall on the first floor. Leaked about 150 gallons of diesel from the saddle tanks, breached 3 load baring walls, and will remain in the side of the building for at least 24 more hours until the building can be stabalized enough to remove it safely. The amazing thing is that the driver hit the retaining wall, which is a pretty steep slope and roughly 10 feet tall, with enough speed to cause the whole rig to impact a small tree 4-5 feet up the trunk. This tree was only about 4 feet away from the wall!!! Then this rig continues airborn for well over 100 feet, crossing a retention pond and a parking lot without causing the bit of damage! The amazing thing, only the driver was seriously injured! The only other casualty was a lady who sustained some minor lacerations to her legs. The search effort took firefighters approximately 6 hours to complete!

Yes, I was on duty at the time of the incident, yes, I worked the call, and in 8 years on the fire service, that is the most amazing thing I have ever seen! There was only about 30 feet of a 60 foot long trailer sticking out the side of the building!

[WEC]

As is the norm for a range report, I will ask: Where are the pictures?!?! Judging from your detailed description, this was one doozy of an incident. Sure would like some pictures to go along with the written words.

[CJATE]

seems it had quite a bight of flight

http://www.kwtx.com/home/headlines/41177217.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Vic303]

OMG! That is a spectacular crash...have they figured out his groundspeed to have made it airborne that far at that weight yet?

[DoubleJ]

somebody called for room service???

[Oldgringo]

That would be the mother of all "Wake Up" calls.

[casingpoint]

Got to be a Mack truck.

[txfireguy2003]

I wish I had some pics to post, but I was busy searching the three rooms he totally destroyed for their occupants. Luckily, all were accounted for after a few hours though. It certainly was spectacular! As for the post regarding it being a Mack truck....all I know for sure is that it had a Cummins engine as that's about all that was still intact by the time I made it into that particular room. I started my efforts on the second floor, where we found his CB radio, some documents and other items from the cab of the truck, all while standing pretty much on top of his sleeper. Some pics are available on kwtx.com, kcentv.com, but they are sort of limited. No ground speed calculations yet that I know of, but the assumption is that he was traveling at highway speeds with cruise control on when he lost consciousness. But they won't be able to calculate the ground speed anyway, since the law of gravity apparently doesn't apply to this particular 18 wheeler. No, in all honesty, I'm not sure if the officers themselves have the ability to calculate the speed. When I was in cop school, we learned how to calculate speed using skid marks, but they never discussed vehicles that levitate!

[KD5NRH]

When I was in cop school, we learned how to calculate speed using skid marks, but they never discussed vehicles that levitate!

It should be a fairly straightforward (not particularly simple by most standards, but your have three reference points - launch, tree impact, and building impact) ballistics equation.

[Keith B]

There should be a gross weight listed in the log book showing his load and rig combined. From there is is a matter of physics, but there are still a lot of variables to factor in. My calculations from the photos and videos show his speed was somewhere between zero and the speed of light.

[Wildscar]

My calculations from the photos and videos show his speed was somewhere between zero and the speed of light.

Possibly even ludicrous speed.

[DoubleJ]

When I first saw the headline, I was like, "Well, at least they called it a Semi, and a FullAuto truck... or even worse, a MachineTruck!!!"



....where's that rimshot.......

[KD5NRH]

There should be a gross weight listed in the log book showing his load and rig combined. From there is is a matter of physics, but there are still a lot of variables to factor in.

Wind resistance should be negligible for a multi-ton object that's not exactly parachute-shaped over 108ft of flight. I don't know how the fact that it's essentially two objects joined by a flexible portion would affect the motion, though.

Was there a GPS anywhere in the rig that might have logged its data? I know a lot of the aftermarket dashboard nav type GPSs have a logging option hidden deep in the menus, but whether it's on or off by default seems to vary by manufacturer.

[tboesche]

Most company trucks nowadays have either the Xata system or some other system that I can not remember the name of. The track everything, MPG, they can tell howmany times the driver hard brakes, max speed the truck has travelled, all kinds of stuff.

[txfireguy2003]

Yeah, a GPS with external data server or something at the central dispatch facility might be usefull, but short of a "black box" like in aircraft....I wouldn't count on gathering any information from any items in the rig itself. No kidding, the CB radio flew out of the front of the cab and burried itself in an interior wall of the hotel....on the second floor. Yeah, I know it would be a "simple physics equation", and with some review of high school physics and calculus, I could probably do it, BUT it might be useless in court. I am sure there are some guys who are "Master Accident Investigators" or some other rediculous certification title like that, who could figure it out, just don't know if we have any in Temple.