A tractor-trailer driver in West Virginia was rescued from his cab after it was left dangling over the edge of a bridge, with only his load of bricks preventing a plunge to the roadway below. The incident occurred just after 5am Tuesday on US 35 at the Sixteen Mile Creek Road intersection in Mason County, WOWK reports. Authorities say the semi lost control and struck a concrete barrier, leaving the cab hanging over the edge of the bridge and the rest of the vehicle perched precariously.
Emergency crews determined the weight of the trailer's cargo of bricks was all that kept the vehicle from toppling over the edge. Point Pleasant Fire Department Chief Jeremy Bryant estimates the cargo weighed 40,000 pounds, WV Metro News reports. "The only think I can say is that the Good Lord was watching out for this young man today and he was able to be successfully rescued and he's going to live to see another day," he says.
Firefighters used a ladder truck to lower firefighter Westley "Wes" Quinn to the cab, where he secured the driver before the pair were hoisted to safety. The driver, who was trapped in the cab for about 5½ hours, was not injured. "I just tried to slip the harness on him, get him secured as best as I could, and keep him from stepping on the windshield," Quinn says. "There was a few times he got antsy, which anybody would, and you know, I just kept reassuring him I was there with him."
Bryant says that trucks have gone over the bridge in the past but that he's never seen a crash like this before. "In the 35 years I've been doing this that's was probably one of the most technical and difficult rescues we've been involved in," the fire chief says. "You don't see that every day of a tractor being basically suspended in the air."
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
