How many pounds is 6 tons?

It could be worse! She could have went in to be a doctor!

As a retired professional driver of 33 years, 3 million miles with no accidents, I took pride in the way I drove and knew I was on display every mile. You can't miss an 18 wheeler.
Drivers today don't seem to care. If they get fired for doing something stupid another company will put them in a truck. Drivers are in such short supply that some companies will hire anyone with a CDL.
I hope they pull her CDL and see that she never gets another one.
That being said, driver training as a whole leaves a LOT to be desired. I rode with my Grandson shortly after he got his license and was appalled at some of the things he did. Following to close, speeding, rolling stops, driving in the left lane,etc. I spent about six hours with him trying to correct all the bad habits that his paid driver training did nothing about. He told me that most of what I taught him wasn't even mentioned in his classes. I guess he would qualify for a CDL, he knows how many pounds in 6 tons.

Here's another article I read on this, one I read said she got her CDL in May, 2015.

On December 25, 2015, on or about 1200 hours, Mary Lambright, 23 year old female from Fredericksburg, Indiana was driving a 2015 Volvo Semi Truck with a 53 foot box trailer containing 43,000 pounds of bottled water. Ms. Lambright stated her intentions were to park her semi in the parking lot of the Paoli Wal-Mart. Lambright entered the square from East Main Street and missed the exit heading to Wal-Mart and exited onto West Main Street. Ms. Lambright then turned left onto Southwest 1st Street in an attempt to turn around. She travel down Southwest 1st and turned left onto South Gospel Street. She made several attempts to turn left on to South Oak Street but was unsuccessful. Ms. Lambright was aware of a parking lot further north on South Gospel Street and determined she could turn the truck around in the lot to get back to Southwest 1st Street. When she approached the parking lot she discovered it was full of heavy equipment and could not use it to turn around. Ms. Lambright was aware of the iron bride stating she had driven on it several times in her personal vehicle and was also aware of the posted signage “no semis, weight limit of 6 tons”. When asked by Paoli Police why she continued through the bridge knowing the weight limit was only 6 tons she admitted to not knowing how many pounds that was. She was advised the weight of the vehicle at the time of the crash was close to 30 tons. Ms. Lambright stated she wasn’t comfortable backing the semi up and made the decision to try to go through the bridge. When the semi entered the bridge the trailer immediately began ripping open due to the trailer was taller than the top of the bridge. As the vehicle continued the weight of the vehicle caused the bridge to collapse. Ms. Lambright and her 17 year old female cousin, who was also in the vehicle, exited the vehicle and were unharmed. Ms. Lambright received her CDL endorsement on 5/12/2015. She currently works for Louisville Logistics out of Louisville, Kentucky. The vehicle and trailer were hauled to Wilcox wrecker service out of Salem, Indiana and is being held pending an inspection by the Indiana State Police.
Agencies/Companies involved in this incident are;
Paoli Police, Orange County Sheriff Department, Paoli Fire and Rescue, Paoli Town employees, IU Health, Wilcox Wrecker Service, Hankins Corvette Sales, and Kendell Trucking
Ms. Lambright is cited for the following;
Indiana code 9-21-8-50, reckless operation of Tractor-Trailer, a class B misdemeanor
Indiana code 9-21-8-41, disregarding a traffic control device, a class B infraction
Indiana code 9-20-7-1, overweight on posted bridge.

As said, there's a lot of sharp qualified professional drivers and then there's.......
BUT that is true of EVERY trade and profession.
Had a state highway closed for 10days this summer for one of my construction projects. Typical spec detour/alt route/local traffic only etc signage. At least 3 or 4 semis a day would get themselves trapped in town. No worries on one end it was easy to drive around the block with big vehicles and the other end had an area big enough to turn around a semi no problem IF the driver could back a trailer. Had 2 separate women drivers that could not back their rigs into this turnaround. Both just ended up backing them straight back 1/4 mile to the nearest cross street where they could make a lap around. Sheeeesh!

Maybe that Paoli Wal-Mart is hiring.

Cheap freight equals cheap rates, which amounts to drivers making less then they did 20 yrs ago. Turn over rate is out of this world. Lot of people getting in the business thinking they will make money, only to get out within the first year.

Trucking Companies don't want to pay for professionals. Instead, they buy trucks with automatic transmissions (put in gear and go) and put twenty year olds on the road after 4-6 wks worth of training.


You should be scared....very scared. This type of stupidity is on the rise.

Yet, surprisingly...most fatal accidents involving a tractor-trailer and a car, the car is at fault :h

By the way....the report also gets her weight wrong claiming the truck weight closed to 30 tons. That VOLVO with a 53' trailer is over 30,000lbs by itself---lets call it 34,000. She was hauling 43,000lbs of water, which equals 77,000lbs.

Then again----the reporter doesn't need to know the difference between 60,000lbs and 77,000lbs. However, she should have.

6 tons is about what that front axle weighs.

I posted this comment once but it never showed up.

If you're an American, 6 tons is 12,000 pounds (2000 pounds = a "short" ton. If you're British, 6 tons is 13,440 pounds, since the "Imperial" ton weighs 2240 pounds.

A Metric "tonne" is just a few pounds less than the Britsh ton.

Came across a semi a few years ago, stuck in the middle of nowhere on Cottonwood canyon Rd (Southern Utah, near Kodachrome). Driver from Canada headed to I don't remember where, had made it about 25mi down a 40mi dirt road before he got to a tight uphill turn. As he backed down to swing wider, the trailer tires went up the high-side of the hill and lifted his passenger side drive wheels off the ground. Luckily we were able to get up on the hill side in my truck and get around him and continue on (where we later broke a rear brake line).

I don't know what goes through these peoples' heads. 'Most' of us would have taken an alternate route when the pavement ended, but no, this guy keeps rollin right on along.

Here is where he got stuck. The north part of the route is where the pavement ends.
Map

There is going to be idiots in every profession. I run a company that has 95 trucks and 140 drivers delivering some of the most dangerous cargo around, petroleum products. We have the most stringent safety requirements for our drivers and still have accidents. This lady is just plain stupid and hurts her entire industry.