Imagine, if in some future post-brexit dystopian nightmare you have to cross a corrupt irishmans palm with cash for passage somewhere in the back of a fridge trailer.
What would you do if you found yourself abandoned for too long, in the same position as those 39 Vietnamese. You are aware there is a finite amount of air.
Using all your experience, what would you do to save your life, and possibly your companions? Assuming you were the only one with a trucking background.
I have no fridge trailer background, only fridge containers. So never get in the back of them. So my initial thoughts were, could the combined effort of the 39 shoulder barging the doors generate enough force to break the seal or buckle them enough to let some air in?
Or is there a drain hole or pipe that you could put your mouth against to draw outside air? Or, perhaps, are there grub screws on the deck that you could try to undo with keys or something, to force an opening? Are there inspection panels for fridge motor that could be removed, and then gain access to air?
What would you do?
It would have been pitch dark in their i imagine so you wouldnt see anything to be able to do anything , all you would have is the torch on your phone but the battery on that would be saved to call family etc
Trailer was loaded afaik so not a hope of getting near the floor of the trailer for drain holes etc
Force the back doors doubtful , the nation of people inside are naturally of small build , fit and energetic maybe , strength wise doubtful , they would nt have body weight to use as ramming effect , also with it been loaded i would imagine they could only get to the top few feet of the door to push out , which i def couldnt see giving way especially since it looked like a pretty new trailer so it was in good shape ,no doors rusted falling off hinges etc
Fridge was running , these people wouldnt have a clue how that worked or what if anything was behind it if they were to pull it off the bulk head , as a ordinary person i prob would do is rip cardboard off the loads packaging or use anything in the load to try and stuff the vents where the cold air is coming out of hoping it would blow a fuse somewhere and the cold air would stop blowing
Banging against the walls of the trailer is all you really could do but of no use unless the truck trailer is stuck in traffic , at traffic lights parked services etc , while the truck is moving i doubted any noise would be heard from anyone in passing cars etc
It must have been an horrific death for them as i would imagine it was over a period of time they suffered due to been suffocated rather then just instant death. I cant bear to think what they were going through , i just hope their is a better life on the other side for them if their is such a place
The fridge wasn’t running…
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Don’t think the fridge would make any difference, they died of asphyxiation not hypothermia. The fridge recycles air inside the trailer so it wouldn’t have helped if it was running. I can’t imagine any way you could get out of a refrigerated trailer myself, they are double-walled and very strong in construction, you’d need a battering ram of some description and a long run-up to force the doors open, a load retaining bar would be pretty ineffective.
Hindsight is the perfect sight. I very much appreciate that these particular refugees were escaping from a regime with an (probably deserved) mistrust of authority and so would be very reluctant to contact said authorities, but hindsight tells me that if only one had phoned any emergency number they knew then the authorities could’ve maybe tracked their devices and perhaps rescued them.
Of course asphyxiation would I imagine be a gradual thing that the victim probably wouldn’t realise what was happening until it was too late to act on it.
Harry Monk:
Don’t think the fridge would make any difference, they died of asphyxiation not hypothermia.
Hypoxia and hyperthermia (which is the exact opposite of hypothermia). Had the fridge been running (at a cool temperature, not freezing) some of them might have survived.
^^^ how? Lack of oxygen was the problem, not lack of a comfortable temperature.
Maybe not get in the back to begin with?
See, that H&S course did come in handy.
39 people breath in the oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide, we cannot live on carbon dioxide. At present Wheel Nut is in the house with a mask, an Oxygen Generator and a pump, with 8 spare cylinders for when I go outside or in a car.
It is an awful feeling being short of breathing air and my oxygen levels are around 20% lower than normal.
It is Hypoxia via Hypoxaemia not Hypothermia
Roymondo:
Harry Monk:
Don’t think the fridge would make any difference, they died of asphyxiation not hypothermia.Hypoxia and hyperthermia (which is the exact opposite of hypothermia). Had the fridge been running (at a cool temperature, not freezing) some of them might have survived.
They died from oxygen deprivation. The fridge motor recirculates air already inside the fridge body and does not draw in fresh air, it would have made no difference had it been running.
Roof is the weak point. Assuming there’s someone’s shoulders to get on and you’ve got something to pierce it with, and remove the insulation, like a penknife.
Interesting regarding roof as weakest point. Could the load restraining bar be turned on its end and ratcheted against the roof? Assume it must be about 2.5m in length. Also, assume trailer must be 4m high. What is the internal height?
Mao makes a good point. Why, when they were texting home saying goodbye, not contact emergency services instead? Out of the 39 surely one must of had knowledge of this? I wonder whether, as illegal immigrants, they were scared of possible punishment…rather than the slap on the wrist they would of received here, as opposed to what they would get back in the orient.
Janos:
Interesting regarding roof as weakest point. Could the load restraining bar be turned on its end and ratcheted against the roof? Assume it must be about 2.5m in length. Also, assume trailer must be 4m high. What is the internal height?
Mao makes a good point. Why, when they were texting home saying goodbye, not contact emergency services instead? Out of the 39 surely one must of had knowledge of this? I wonder whether, as illegal immigrants, they were scared of possible punishment…rather than the slap on the wrist they would of received here, as opposed to what they would get back in the orient.
A fridge trailer is taller than it is wide and retaining bars are normally spring-loaded and so could not be ratcheted against anything. My understanding is that none of them had a phone signal and left farewell messages on their phones as posterity.
Even a curtainsided trailer is almost impossible to get out of without tools if accidentally locked in- this has happened to me- so I would say that with a metal-sided trailer there would be no chance whatsoever.
BREXIT IS DONE.
the maoster:
^^^ how? Lack of oxygen was the problem, not lack of a comfortable temperature.
My thinking goes along the lines that as the temperature rises the body goes into overdrive trying to both sweat and pump blood to the skin to get rid of the heat, while at low temperatures it will instead slow down, using less oxygen.
I’m not suggesting they would have all leapt out of the trailer with a cheery wave to the driver!
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It was a Schmitz Cargobull trailer. Made of Ferroplast (steel/plastic/steel laminate). It’s pretty tough…I was invited to wallop a sheet of it with a lump hammer, and only made a small dent. Even that was enough to make the SCB tech director frown, whip it away from me and say “This must go back to the lab.”
It also forms a Farraday Cage. The messages were written on mobiles, but remained unsent until the phones were removed from the trailer…there is no signal inside. The trailer itself is pretty much airtight, and the insulation is sound-deadening. Small fridge vans are used to steal high-value motorcycles: once the doors are shut you can’t hear the alarm and no tracker signal can get out.
From a smuggler’s point of view the SCB trailer is X-ray and sniffer proof unless open. From the smuggled’s point of view, the clock is ticking as soon as the doors are shut. There are finite reserves of oxygen, and unless someone opens the door before they are gone, you are dead.
It’s a risk you take…a $10,000 fee and your possible death.
cgscott:
BREXIT IS DONE.
Which is somehow relevant to this discussion…?
cgscott:
BREXIT IS DONE.
Are you on the right thread mate? Or are you just a complete ■■■■■
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