Seems to be at least a weekly occurrence that traffic on the M20 grinds to a halt…
kentonline.co.uk/maidstone/n … m20-20900/
And then this happened in the queue:
Vanessa Pizzey wrote:
Lorry drivers don’t know how too drive it’s too fast and lane hoggers
Well Overloaded though with 38 ton of fruit onboard maybe the axle caught fire
Having been overtaken Eastbound (at no more than about 65) by the second fire engine to reach the scene, I passed this on the opposite carriageway.The trailer was well alight at the rear with the driver about 200 yards away with his Stralis and the Westbound traffic held back about 300 yards further on. About a mile further on came the 1st attending fire engine negotiating the hard shoulder. About 3 or 4 miles later the 2nd fire engine was just coming back onto the westbound carriageway having used the emergency gates and bridge near Lenham Heath.
The pictures in the link make the scene appear to be much nearer to J8 that it actually was.
With this being foreign and a fridge, I suppose the biggest dangers are presented by the plastic fuel tank and the far worse possibility of an LPG cylinder in the driver’s trailer locker.
edit add:
I wonder whether Hato bother to warn drivers leaving the M20 at J9 Eastbound that the bridge at Harrietsham is only 15’ 3". It must have rather disrupted things at Lenham Storage.
Hope the driver and his double man are OK and got any important possessions out, see a lot of PrimaFrio about on my deliveries, they can’t reverse for toffee but that’s another story.
cav551:
Having been overtaken Eastbound (at no more than about 65) by the second fire engine to reach the scene, I passed this on the opposite carriageway.The trailer was well alight at the rear with the driver about 200 yards away with his Stralis and the Westbound traffic held back about 300 yards further on. About a mile further on came the 1st attending fire engine negotiating the hard shoulder. About 3 or 4 miles later the 2nd fire engine was just coming back onto the westbound carriageway having used the emergency gates and bridge near Lenham Heath.The pictures in the link make the scene appear to be much nearer to J8 that it actually was.
With this being foreign and a fridge, I suppose the biggest dangers are presented by the plastic fuel tank and the far worse possibility of an LPG cylinder in the driver’s trailer locker.
edit add:
I wonder whether Hato bother to warn drivers leaving the M20 at J9 Eastbound that the bridge at Harrietsham is only 15’ 3". It must have rather disrupted things at Lenham Storage.
Bridge is now back at 15’ 6’'.Been that way for about a year.
fingermissing:
cav551:
Having been overtaken Eastbound (at no more than about 65) by the second fire engine to reach the scene, I passed this on the opposite carriageway.The trailer was well alight at the rear with the driver about 200 yards away with his Stralis and the Westbound traffic held back about 300 yards further on. About a mile further on came the 1st attending fire engine negotiating the hard shoulder. About 3 or 4 miles later the 2nd fire engine was just coming back onto the westbound carriageway having used the emergency gates and bridge near Lenham Heath.The pictures in the link make the scene appear to be much nearer to J8 that it actually was.
With this being foreign and a fridge, I suppose the biggest dangers are presented by the plastic fuel tank and the far worse possibility of an LPG cylinder in the driver’s trailer locker.
edit add:
I wonder whether Hato bother to warn drivers leaving the M20 at J9 Eastbound that the bridge at Harrietsham is only 15’ 3". It must have rather disrupted things at Lenham Storage.Bridge is now back at 15’ 6’'.Been that way for about a year.
Unless I was seeing things on Thursday it is signed as 15’ 6" Eastbound but 15’ 3" Westbound.
ADR 1:
Vanessa Pizzey wrote:
Lorry drivers don’t know how too drive it’s too fast and lane hoggers
Yeh, I didn’t get a degree in English either alas.
Ergo Cognito Sum. - It’s a ■■■■ sight easier.
Wing and a prayer:
Well Overloaded though with 38 ton of fruit onboard maybe the axle caught fire
Maybe the fruit was fermenting, and the alchohol vapour caught fire from someone having a crafy ■■■ at the wheel…
I too would like to know why the motorway was shut for 9 hours because of a lorry fire.
The surface is concrete, it was the hard shoulder…If resurfacing is required it could have been done overnight.
Just what is happening to our roads infrastructure■■? Do those who manage them need retraining■■?
We, as a country will go broke at this rate!
Watching the local news and the video footage they had by a in car camera just after the fire started it looks like it was the middle axle where it started .
gazza1970:
Watching the local news and the video footage they had by a in car camera just after the fire started it looks like it was the middle axle where it started .
looked like it started inside in the middle . prob a twin evap trailer and the rear evap caught alight. just my guess tho. but could also have had his dinner on the slow boil in the pallet carriers . looked too far fwd to be axles
It wasn’t a car, it even says in the story smoldering. The Fire block all the lanes and have to ensure it wont re-ignite which, I hasten to add has happened to me at 2 lorry fires and a car fire. Then as you can see, the tippers are parked across 1 and 2 and 2 and 3 to load as their grabs only reach so far. Listen, I sympathise with any of you stuck in it, its crap and if I go away, I could get stuck in it too. I feel for all you guys who are day drivers and want to get home but have to have a night out but what can we do? Shut it at night to clear it? Then the complaints will be massive diversions at night, we can’t win. Just think, we didn’t ask the truck to catch fire but we do our best to deal with it.
Big Jase:
It wasn’t a car, it even says in the story smoldering. The Fire block all the lanes and have to ensure it wont re-ignite which, I hasten to add has happened to me at 2 lorry fires and a car fire. Then as you can see, the tippers are parked across 1 and 2 and 2 and 3 to load as their grabs only reach so far. Listen, I sympathise with any of you stuck in it, its crap and if I go away, I could get stuck in it too. I feel for all you guys who are day drivers and want to get home but have to have a night out but what can we do? Shut it at night to clear it? Then the complaints will be massive diversions at night, we can’t win. Just think, we didn’t ask the truck to catch fire but we do our best to deal with it.
In this case I would say once the fire was well and truly out the road should have been opened and recovered at nite as there are two good diversion routes via the A20 or A251 which will cope perfectly with the lower volumes of traffic at nite
chester1:
Big Jase:
It wasn’t a car, it even says in the story smoldering. The Fire block all the lanes and have to ensure it wont re-ignite which, I hasten to add has happened to me at 2 lorry fires and a car fire. Then as you can see, the tippers are parked across 1 and 2 and 2 and 3 to load as their grabs only reach so far. Listen, I sympathise with any of you stuck in it, its crap and if I go away, I could get stuck in it too. I feel for all you guys who are day drivers and want to get home but have to have a night out but what can we do? Shut it at night to clear it? Then the complaints will be massive diversions at night, we can’t win. Just think, we didn’t ask the truck to catch fire but we do our best to deal with it.In this case I would say once the fire was well and truly out the road should have been opened and recovered at nite as there are two good diversion routes via the A20 or A251 which will cope perfectly with the lower volumes of traffic at nite
Once an area is safe there is no reason why the recovery cannot take place at night, at my last firm a guy put one on her side in France, was on the embankment and hard shoulder not interfering with any lanes gendarmes said they would arrange for recovery at around midnight this was around 10 in the morning.
OMG… Think of the Cherry Tomatoes
Many recoveries are completed at night so there must have been a good reason for it. Perhaps Fire stayed on scene for some time whilst it was ripped apart and the fruit moved to ensure there wasn’t still smoldering underneath otherwise Fire might have had to sit there until night time awaiting recovery in case it did reignite.
I’m just surmising of course, we probably kept it shut just to peeeece everyone off for fun.
Big Jase:
Many recoveries are completed at night so there must have been a good reason for it. Perhaps Fire stayed on scene for some time whilst it was ripped apart and the fruit moved to ensure there wasn’t still smoldering underneath otherwise Fire might have had to sit there until night time awaiting recovery in case it did reignite.I’m just surmising of course, we probably kept it shut just to peeeece everyone off for fun.
I went past about 1330 and apart from a bit of smouldering the fire was out and fire crews just raking thru the oranges or tomato’s. im not sure fruit with a high content of water re ignite that easily and most of it where the fire caught hold where already on the floor in lane one .once fully out they could have re opened the outside two lanes let the traffic clear then closed again at night to recover . its just over the top police or hato with there daft over the top risk assesments
chester1:
I went past about 1330 and apart from a bit of smouldering the fire was out and fire crews just raking thru the oranges or tomato’s. im not sure fruit with a high content of water re ignite that easily and most of it where the fire caught hold where already on the floor in lane one .once fully out they could have re opened the outside two lanes let the traffic clear then closed again at night to recover . its just over the top police or hato with there daft over the top risk assesments
So they were raking through the fruit. Why do you think they have fire crews on £30.000 plus I expect, pumps sat there and engines running just to rake? Could it be that they are ensuring the fire won’t re-ignite?
You say once fully out we could have opened the outside 2 lanes, well that’s your opinion, you were not there, your’e not a Fireman or roads expert so you can only say what you wanted to have happen.
It isn’t just over the top Police ir Hato daft risk assessments at all and you know nothing about what we do or why we do it and are not interested in learning either. Do you seriously think, when we have to answer to the Government with hundreds of phone calls back and forth to hundreds of high up people that we would just keep a road closed to annoy thousands of people and clog up diversion routes?
I spoke with a dufus yesterday moaning about a road closure and came up with that chestnut “He’s dead, just pick him up and open the road” I have to trains of thought on this.
- If I say I ■■■■■■ your mum last night, you would punch ten bales of sheet out of me and rightly so, so why is it ok to just scoop up someones son/daughter/mum/dad and not investigate how or why they died and who was to blame? Think of the Dutch who have lost in the plane crash who’s bodies are still rotting on the ground or will never be found, they want closure, so would you.
2.Instead of slagging of the Police or HATO’s for shutting a road, why don’t you blame the guy who went into the back of the Sainsburys lorry in another story or blame the royal Mail driver who hit the barrier as he was asleep or on the phone, jack knifed and caused another lorry to roll, or blame the tanker driver who hit the truck that was stationary on the hard shoulder on the M6 or blame the driver on the M25 who was speeding, rolled and injured 3 road workers, or blame the driver who made my guys stop in an ERA on the M25 to check on him only to find he stopped for a break then blame the lorry driver who hit a car and caused it to slam into my guys putting them in hospital and closing the M25.
You see, if people did what they should behind the wheel, be a safe and professional driver, none of this would have happened and hence there would be no closures. It always makes me laugh at how many people moan about bad drivers yet if everyone is such a saint, who are the people driving badly? I know, you don’t recognise your’e a bad driver and if you do, you don’t care and will continue driving that way as you want to.
To be fair, it probably IS daft over the top risk assessments. I mean there were never all these closures in previous decades to the same degree, unless there was a major accident.
What has changed?
No disrespect, but sometimes a bit of common sense is missing in these cases. So the surface is damaged in lane one? Get the resurfacing boys out ready to roll at night, throw some cones out (shut lane one) and have everything use lane two and three. What’s so difficult about that?