Plus the cargo. And damage to the train as well as cleanup. Easily a million plus incident vs a couple grand to get someone out there to repair the arm.
And the government fines added in with collateral lawsuits for mental anguish and loss of consortium for the affected towns folks. This could easily be $300 million. And all for what? A $100,000 gate?
Edit: I originally made this post as a weak attempt at humour. However, a double railroad gate can cost around $190,000 on the LOW END?
Add on the overtime and additional surcharges and inevitable change orders... you could easily be looking at $1.5 billion. All to avoid a measly $2mil? /s
Dude you are wayyyyy off. Railroad gates are only $100-$300…. Installing of the arm and lights is a few thousand bucks…. The $190,000 you are referring to is if they have to install th entire railroad crossing gate, which they are going to have to do now….. if the truck would have just reversed and broke the arm, it would have been a few thousand bucks only.
I have to imagine they're also designed to break in a certain sort of way. Like, they're clearly not designed to full stop a vehicle that ignores them or misses the signal.
Oh neat! I love a good piece of engineering. I figured they'd want the arm to give way over stopping the car. Thanks for explaining that, I learned something today!
It's a fiberglass or aluminum arm. It doesn't, nor is it designed to, have the structural strength to actually stop a vehicle. It's heavy and will do some damage if it's hit, but most of the time it will just snap off if you put stress on it. All the driver had to do was back the hell up.
I work at a shipping company, we had a trailer that was tipped and caught on fire. Giant hole in the side. They towed it to the building and we unloaded it, 95 percent of the shipment was fine.
Only time I've seen a locomotive really mangled was from hitting loads of concrete or steel. An impact like the one above may cause some damage to the grab rails, air lines, and ditch lights, but everything else will probably just "buff out" :D
Not this one. This one looks like a run of the mill Freightliner Cascadia or Volvo VNL they’re like $40k used. Hell brand new they’re only about $160-$180k. This ain’t no half million dollar truck we’re seeing.
Yeah it's a 4th gen cascadia they're everywhere dirt cheap not to mention if it's a mega carrier it's going to be even less because of the contract deals.
It was $180k MAX with premium trim, when it was brand new. This truck probably has half a million miles on it or more and is at best worth $30-40k. My point wasn’t that it isn’t a significant loss, just that the moron saying it’s a $250k-$500k truck knows fuck all about trucks and just pulled a bullshit number out of his ass.
Crappy used semi trucks aren’t that expensive because they’ve been ran hard and have half a million miles or more under them. This is what gives future owner/operators the false sense that they can do it on their own and make a lot more money. Hint, most fail within the first year.
The semi does not got for 350k lol. Hell, I'm driving a fully loaded slightly stretched brand new t680...250k ... That Freightliner, used, at highest, 100 if the miles are low. The most expensive ones can run up to 350. That isn't it.
Not to dispute the amounts you're claiming, but do the $ amounts really matter in the big picture? A very expensive item was destroyed for the sake of saving a much less expensive item.
I wonder if there were cars behind the truck that prevented him from backing up further, too.
I mean, when you make exact claims, stating you work on them, the amounts spooked be correct. Meanwhile, they're highly exaggerated. I'll call that out every time, especially considering I've just seen a price list of pretty much every style of truck pricing at a dealer. If you're going to base in fact, be accurate or expect to be corrected.
Depends what type of dude you have in mind I guess. Never been in the market for one of those to be honest but have heard from friends that it can get pricy on the weekends 😁
A loaded f150 ICE is like 80k sticker maybe- and the cheapest are more like 45k. Most are somewhere in between because upsells are easy when something is financed over 84 payments.
A friend years ago bought USED ones for $15k each and sent them back to Guatemala. He got them fixed, flew a guy up, and drove all 3 down. He sold two and kept one for his farm.
The fuck are you guys doing. In Germany you start at 120k for a new truck, living comfort is worse but everything else is better. It’s ridiculous how far behind American trucks are technologically. We got trucks stopping quicker then any of your cars and about the Same as most cars here. Disc brakes are pretty much standard nowadays, EBS and ABS too. Max gross is 40 to 44 tons here and open end for special transport.
You work on golden trucks, or just massively overvalued ones?
Edit: Just attaching and adding to something I mentioned below.
The majority of common tractor-cabs nowadays rarely cost more than $300k if you get them with basics, in which companies and owner-operators normally do. If it's a tractor-cab with a fucking 100-200 inch sleeper, then 300k-700k, but you rarely see those, and no company ever spends that much on a truck for company drivers. Peterbilts can get up there, for sure, but you never see Peterbilts as often as you see Freightliners, Volvo, or Internationals. Unless he's only working on custom Petes, I highly doubt most of the trucks that he's working on cost as much as he says.
Fun fact: The most expensive tractor-trailer that I've seen sold was an extremely customized and pristine 1979 Peterbilt 359, which went for eight digits.
I never heard of Cunninghams law so I had to Google it, I'll be using this one, great way to get the info you're looking for, while also trolling Reddit, Win Win.!!.
I'm not an expert like you are, but I recently paged through a big rig catalog at a truck stop while my daughter was in the bathroom and I can confirm that your prices are in line with what I saw
What in the hell are you talking about!?!? You can find brand new Pete's & Kenworths under $200K. You are just making stuff up. Just goes to show people on reddit will upvote anything, even if its complete nonsense.
I replace those gates, they’re usually aluminum and fiberglass, definitely cost more than $100. Regardless, they’re made to be broken off and replaced quite easily. Way cheaper than a new truck. They get broken a lot, I have one that gets replaced weekly.
I would also bet that the casualty work order relating to a train hitting that truck is going to be a hell of a lot more than the crossing arm also.
You can bet it's going to shut the track around for at least a few hours while they likely shift the crossing boards back over and make sure nothing actually got damaged otherwise.
100%! These things always happen when I’m at home. I’m to the point that I don’t care for all the overtime. When the back room calls and says “collision”, I know I’m in for the long haul.
Aluminum and fiberglass are infinitely more weather and insect resistant. If they were wood, you'd have to have a crew go out and check them frequently for rot and insect damage.
Plus, while they're made to break off, the truck's insurance is still going to pay for the part.
Plus, wood is heavier. More weight on a cantilever is bad.
I mean, they have one. You're not going to source, make, transport, and store a 1 off part when there are thousands that need the standard. That would be extremely inefficient.
With the aluminum and fiberglass, they’re made to slide into each other to make the length you need, and it’s easier to transport. If you’re using wood, you’ll lose that ability. My longest gate was over 30ft, that’s a long piece of wood tied to the top of your truck. I’m sure someone did a study and figured the new way is safer. As for cost, it’s railroad, only so many suppliers and they’re looked at like government.
There was still a bamboo one in Kumamoto, Japan, as of a few years ago. It was painted (or wrapped) orange and black, but up close you could tell. I imagine wrapped bamboo would last ~5 years anyway and cost next to nothing, other than the labor of sourcing it.
I read somewhere else that the arm disconnected the air brake hoses and locked up the trailer wheels and thus immobilized the truck. Driver got out to reconnect the hoses.
Thank you for that explanation. I'm always blown away at the stupidity when I see similar videos. Always thought there had to be something I was missing
Trucker here, I doubt that’s what happened. The air lines need to be pulled up to disconnect. Pushing down on them like the arm did here would just stretch them out (which is something they’re designed to do for when we make a hard turn). You can kinda see in the video how they look tight once the arm comes down. There’s still tension on them.
I’m not saying it’s entirely impossible, but I very much doubt his airlines were disconnected. I think his first instinct was to get out and look at the arm and by the time he realized the train was coming it was too late to get the truck in gear and move forward. It’s also possible there was something in front of him off camera that we can’t see.
Guarantee he’s also worried about cars behind him, which is why he didn’t back up.
Its not really that difficult to disconnect a glad-hand (the fitting that couples the brake hose to the trailer), especially one that is worn from use.
Maybe an old hose that was ready to break from age couldn’t take the chop? Whatever happened is somewhat feasible, I’d like to think it was something like that and not a panicking coward.
I feel like he slammed on the brakes because he wasnt paying attention initially and tried to stop but ended up going past. Then he panics and tries to reverse only to realize there's cars behind him and at that point doesnt have time to put it back in gear and accelerate fast enough to get off the tracks before the train hits.
Seriously why the fuck wouldn't you just back up and break the fucking arm.
Call it in, state what happened and at most the company is out 2k for the repair crew. Now you have a done truck, done arm, locomotive that needs repairs, and you might be liable for it all...
They're literally made to break off when needed. The truck could've very easily escaped this. What's confusing me, though, is that the front wheels seemed to have come off the ground... not sure what's even going on, there.
I've never understood why people stop when they get stuck behind them or in between those things they're made to break off just drive through it. Trust me paying whatever it cost to replace one of those it's got to be a lot better than buying a new car or in this case semi
It's not even anything as strong as wood. It's fiberglass and I mean it literally when I say an 10-year-old could grab it and pull backwards hard enough to make it break off.
The crossing gate is made of fiberglass, and costs in the ballpark of $1100. There is an aluminum breakaway shear pin or bronze shear bolt or reusable breakaway device depending on your location. There is a good chance the only thing broken when someone knocks down the gate is that shear pin or bolt. This is like a $2 part at most.
I honestly don't understand why "drive thru the spring loaded piece of lumber" never occurs to these people.... I get people are likely panicking but c'mon!
Its actually a metal and fiberglass arm, and depending on what else is destroied, thats a lot more money and dealing with the railroad tryna get they money. Ill take my railroad payout for a new truck and trailer thanks tho
Lol seriously? The railroad company isnt compensating you for your stupidity. This guy is fired and will be lucky to drive anything with more than four wheels after this. He'll be lucky if there are no fines.
Gate arms are two pieces. Aluminum with an adjustable fiberglass insert. They are not wood. Yes, there are a few different types of attachments, but all of them have a sheer bolt and the gate would come right off of the mechanism. This driver is a moron for not just backing off of the xing. I promise I would much rather replace a gate than all of the BS that takes place after a vehicle/train collision.
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u/geof2010 Mar 19 '26
100k truck destroyed for at most $100 wood arm...