East Bound, Burned Down: Coors Truck Goes Up in Smoke on Bay Bridge

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We love the Bay Bridge. We have many, many fond memories of being stuck in traffic, having our alternator crap out in the rain just past the tollgates and thus missing AFI play a secret set at Bottom of the Hill, of loony drivers jockeying for position in the toll lanes, prospective suicide jumpers making us late for dates; of sitting in traffic for three hours on our way to work when the city of San Francisco blacked out in December, 1998. Essentially, if one little thing goes wrong on the bridge, it can easily back traffic up all the way from Vallejo to the north to Hayward to the south.

And that's just what happened yesterday when a suspected brake problem set fire to a semi filled to the roof with a shipment of Coors. Headed eastbound into Oakland, the rig caught fire on the bridge's lower deck, shutting down all lanes of traffic, as well as two lanes on the westbound upper deck (the part that so famously collapsed in 1989). Although the fire happened in the early afternoon when the bridge is generally relatively calm, authorities weren't able to completely open all lanes until 6pm, as they had to remove the truck's entire cargo of barley pop before the truck could be towed away. How much y'all wanna bet this never happened to Bandit and Snowman? [Thanks to former San Franciscan CTE for the tip.] [Update: Big Rick from KFOG offers a photo of the proceedings from afar.]

99 Bottles of Beer on the Bridge... [SFGate]

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