Square & Compas

Please read all of the information, including and especially the info. that the hyperlinks take you to. I have more info. to post on the blog and will post it as an update to this later today.

In the mean time; https://bicycleadvocacyandsafety.blogspot.com/

Square & Compas

Update; https://bicycleadvocacyandsafety.blogspot.com/

crhilton

Keep pushin' it Square&Compas. I'd like to know how we know the guy left the scene. Is it in the police report? It seems like it'd be a massive failure if he weren't charged. Isn't this a "hit and run?"

I keep thinking this guy should be charged with road rage. It seems like there are a half dozen witnesses that he was losing his temper and either he's unfit to drive or he was too angry at the time to successfully complete the pass.

I think you can pull multiple trailers in Iowa. According to some RV site I found on the web they allow it if your total length is under 70' for RV's (I doubt it's different for pickups).

Square & Compas

The info. about Lynch leaving the scene and returning later is in one of the links in the original blog post. He was not driving an RV. He was driving a pick up truck and towing 2 anhydrous ammonia tanks. These tanks are very large and have 4 wheels each. Yes in Iowa you can tow multiple things with an RV. I do not think you can do so in the application that Lynch was driving/towing. I am still trying to find out if he was in violation of towing laws. The fact that he left the scene, went home and dropped the trailers off tells me he was.

crhilton

Could be. I simply assumed it wouldn't be different between a pickup and an RV.

Seems like leaving the scene is worse than violating towing laws.

Square & Compas

Leaving the scene is definatly worse then violating towing laws. But if towing more then one of these tanks is illegal and had he obeyed that law Doug Smith would never have been hit. It was the second trailer that hit him. Also imagine what would have happened if one of these tanks had capsized and leaked. Or if Lynch had collided with an oncoming vehicle, he passed in a no passing zone, causing a far worse collision thus capsizing one of the ammonia tanks and causing it to leak.

Don't know if know much about anhydrous ammonia, but it is toxic stuff. It will kill you if you breath it in, there is no maybe about it. It pretty much dehydrates and dries your lungs instantly, but death is not immediate. It takes a while for you to die while you suffocate. Very nasty stuff. Everytime there is a spill or leak by one of these trailers any populated area within at least a mile has to be evacuated, no matter how much of a population it is. Could be one or 2 farms or an entire town.

crhilton

Yea I know about the stuff. It'll remove flesh on contact and it's toxic when it forms as a gas. I'm actually from Iowa.

I was actually pointing this out to someone on the Des Moines Register's site: If he'd been in a car it may have been much much worse as the car might have broken open the anhydrous tank.

Square & Compas

As toxic as it is in it's concentrated form, which is usually how it is transported in the tanks and used in industrial refrigeration applications, it is easily diluted and easy to clean up a spill or leak. Enough water will pretty much make ammonia inert and not harmful at all. After water is added then adding some sort of absorbant material and disposing of it is even easier. It is the initial spill or leak that can kill.

brotherj

I hate to say this but this is the way law is enforced in rural Iowa. I lived there for a while and was in an accident. A local farmer came around a blind corner on the shoulder, hit my car and nearly tore the front end off while I was sitting at a stop sign. I was cited for failure to yield. I had a friend that was an attorney and we took the case to court. The deputy sheriff, under oath, said "when I arrived at the accident scene I recognized the driver of vehicle number as xxx a well respected local resident and ticketed the driver of vehicle 2, an individual whom I didn't know."

Thankfully the judge didn't think that was proper. I was found innocent and the judge said, "This was a total travesty. I have no doubt that a ticket should have been issued to one of the drivers, but since you (the deputy) failed to exercise even a modicum of proper investigative procedure I can't determine who was at fault for the accident. If I had the authority I would issue you a citation for incompetence. Case dismissed"

I still ended up with a totaled car, minor injuries and a stay in the hospital. But because I was the stranger I got the ticket. If I hadn't had the lawyer friend it might have gone down differently.