I HATE Illinois

[Poli]

I smacked the front end of my car on an iced over bridge just north of Lincoln, IL, on I-55N.

I wouldn't have a problem with this if a) I had been speeding and not paying attention or b) had been the first person this happened to...but guess what?

I wasn't speeding and there were three or four cars that were already victims to this ice sitting in the median with a complement of police cars and ambulances.

So, why didn't they try and take care of the thing causing all of the freaking problems? Grr...

My first accident of any sort in 10 years. I'm really ticked they didn't try to clear the bridge or anything of the sort.

edit to include road and direction.

[Easy Mac]

Why did you drive there if you saw 4 other cars with the same problem? And it was 72 here today, and right now it is 64 degrees.

[Poli]

Originally posted by Easy Mac
Why did you drive there if you saw 4 other cars with the same problem? And it was 72 here today, and right now it is 64 degrees.

I was in the right lane of the interstate, and it was 5:45pm when it happened...by that I mean, it was too dark to see if they had slid off the road...I didn't realize what the commotion was about until I lost control of my own car.

[MrBug708]

Here I thought this was gonna be a ramble about Bill Self

[Craptacular]

I hate Illinois too, but you know they can't keep every square inch of pavement dry all the time.

[Blade6119]

Everyone hates illinois...its a well documented fact

[Poli]

Like I said, I wouldn't be mad if I was the first or seccond car, but I was most likely the fifth to do it.

[hoopsguy]

I apologize on behalf of my state.

[illinifan999]

IT SNOWED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOOHOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!

[The Afoci]

Come to North Dakota. First off, we have no trees. If it snows and then, God forbid, it blows, they don't even try to plow. Why, because snow drifts about five feet tall just randomly form on the highways. Now they close them down, but the guys with the big four wheel drives give it a go and die each year. I guess you weed out the dumb ones, God just missed this time. ;)

J/K Hope you are okay AE. ;)

[MizzouRah]

You should never go across that bridge! :)

At least you're ok....



Todd

[illinifan999]

No school!

[Poli]

Originally posted by The Afoci
Come to North Dakota. First off, we have no trees. If it snows and then, God forbid, it blows, they don't even try to plow. Why, because snow drifts about five feet tall just randomly form on the highways. Now they close them down, but the guys with the big four wheel drives give it a go and die each year. I guess you weed out the dumb ones, God just missed this time. ;)

J/K Hope you are okay AE. ;)

Dork; and thanks. :)

I was pretty concerned for my life when I was facing the rail of the bridge and yet the car was still moving up the highway. I just knew at any point the car was going to flip and we'd have AE all over a highway.

Fortunately, the traffic behind me was able to slow down and not pulverize me as well.

[Poli]

Originally posted by illinifan999
No school!

Yeah, I'm thinking I won't have class today either, but it hasn't been confirmed yet.

[MrIllini]

Originally posted by Craptacular
I hate Illinois too, but you know they can't keep every square inch of pavement dry all the time.

Oh yeah, cause Wisconsin is MUCH better. :P

[illinifan999]

Originally posted by MrIllini
Oh yeah, cause Wisconsin is MUCH better. :P

They're too much like hicks to want pavement. :p

[cthomer5000]

<font size=4>Caution: Bridge Freezes Before Road Surface</font>

[Coffee Warlord]

Moral of the Story: Illinois Winter Sucks

[Castlerock]

Originally posted by ardent enthusiast
I wouldn't have a problem with this if a) I had been speeding

While you may not have been going faster than the posted speed limit, it does appear that you were traveling too fast for the current road conditions.

Sorry to hear about your accident, though.

[tucker342]

We started two hours late here in Iowa City.... too bad the snow started so early

AE,

sorry to hear about your accident, glad your okay:)

[tucker342]

dola-

what the hell were you doing in Illinois anyways???

[finkenst]

Originally posted by tucker342
dola-

what the hell were you doing in Illinois anyways???

if you look in the left hand column you might see this:

ardent enthusiast
FOFC Survivor

Member ID: 1988
Registered: Apr 2002
Location: Bonne Terre, MO or Great Lakes, IL
Posts: 2108 [3.37/day]
Status: offline


anywho, i live in illinois and i hate it, but i have another 9+ months before i can transfer jobs at my employer and get to switzerland, nashville, or san diego, e.g.

[Surtt]

I used to live in Greenville. The day each year it snowed, it was the same as North Dakota.

Drivers out killing themselves, had a tough time with the concept of slippery roads.

It was 13 degrees below zero when I came to work this morning (35 below with wind chill.)

[Cringer]

I'm sorry, but the worst states are the southern states because they do NOT budget very much, or almost none at all, for plowing/sanding.

In feb. of 2003 some of you may remember Texas getting hit with an ice storm that paralyzed everything from San Antonio up. Well, my co-driver and i hit this the night we left home. I was able to get around San Antonio, who had the interstates in town closed, then headed up I35. Things were ok until i got north of Austin. Mile marker 271 there is a decent little hill, one that to be honest i never really noticed until this day. It was about 2-3 A.M. and traffic, mostly trucks, was stopped. The hill was completely iced over and trucks stuck on it. Come sunlight, guys were able to get moving up the hill, weaving between stuck trucks. My turn comes and i am doing fine, until the truck in front of me starts slowing down, then stopping. Thats it, stuck!! Sat there for about 4 more hours until DPS finally shut it down and got sand trucks to the hill.

My co-driver then took over, and i went to sleep as we drove at about 5 mph up I35, with my dispatch bugging us for an ETA to Lebanon,MO....a lifetime away at this pace. Anyways, i wake up about 8 P.M. that night to the sound of my co-driver yelling "HOLD ON!!!" Not even out of sleep yet i grab onto the bunk harness when, SMACK!!! and then the scary ass feeling of sliding and not knowing where because i'm in the back!

What happened was we had only gotten about another 90 miles from that morning. They had shut down the interstate, and when that happens, hey its time for the back roads! My codriver had been on this road for only a few miles i guess, when he came to a nice little hill on this two lane road. The road went down, into a little valley, then back up a bit steeper then it went down. Another truck had been going up the hill when we reached the bottom. He was almost to the top when he started sliding back down, smacking into us and making both are trucks slide back. What stopped us from going off into a little ravine was his trailer hitting into a tree. To cut this short, there was a local cop behind us when it happened. He started right away to try and get us help, and wreckers, since we blocked the whole road from shoulder to shoulder. In the end, Texas DPS and DOT wouldn't let any wreckers come and help us, because they wanted them on the interstates only "for the time being." We sat there for 24 hrs. in below 30 degree temp. with a truck that we couldn't even turn on (whole front end got crushed) for heat. We finally got out of there because my company was finally able to get a wrecker from Dallas to come down to us with another truck, we got the loner, they towed ours away. Was a fun time, Texas can lick my ass!!

[Poli]

Originally posted by Castlerock
While you may not have been going faster than the posted speed limit, it does appear that you were traveling too fast for the current road conditions.

Sorry to hear about your accident, though.


If the bridge had appeared to have ice on it, I would have slowed down more so than what I was driving. As it was, I most likely was slowing down in the first place, seeing as I had noticed the flashing lights and accident up ahead.

It was dark, and I hadn't noticed snow on the ground and you certainly couldn't see the condition of the bridge.

I'm fortunate to still be able to drive...I'm glad I barely hit the bridge with the front of the car. Heck, the air bags didn't even deploy. I've always wanted to try that. :)

[Poli]

Estimate on the car: just over $2,300.