In Seattle, the old I90 floating bridge across Lake Washington had a "bulge" where a section of the roadway could be pushed into the bulge to make room for boat passage. When the section was retracted, the highway abruptly ended, and a barrier was put up.
The Bulge was infamous for traffic accidents where you suddenly had to swerve right then left then right at highway speed, with narrow lanes lined with concrete walls. This was a challenge for my old car with its loosey goosey suspension. I remember news radio at the time would report on another "flamer" at The Bulge.
Time moves on, and it was time to replace the bridge with a modern, safe one. The construction crew was astonished to find a car at the bottom where the highway abruptly ended when the bridge was retracted. In it was a woman who had been missing for 20 or 30 years. It was a famous case when she went missing, and people searched everywhere for her, including forests where psychics claimed she was.
Apparently, she was simply driving one night, didn't realize that the bridge was out, drove through the barrier into the water and nobody noticed.
Here's a picture from that thread showing how it works and what it's like when it lets boats through: https://i.imgur.com/nIeXbXt.png. I skimmed a bunch of articles about the bridge to figure out how the bulge possibly worked to let boats through, and none were as useful as this diagram.
I had to look this up just to see what this 'right-left' swerve looked like on a bridge... found the following article [1] (from an insurance company no less!) with a picture and a link to an old news article [2] about the missing teen driver.
The SF Bay Bridge added a similar feature during the expensive replacement of the Eastern span, and despite every precaution and a very gradual turn, drivers routinely crashed, and the area was covered with skid marks. One truck went completely over the rail. Apparently a large percentage of drivers go into a state of hypnosis on bridges.
I assume you’re referring to the night they left the plug out? Or did something else happen during the Inaugaral Day windstorm in 1993?
For non-locals: Seattle is separated from the Eastside, the suburbs to the East, by Lake Washington. That lake is deep enough that the two bridges crossing it float on giant pontoons. In the early 90s, they were replacing the old Interstate 90 bridge, and doing some work on the old span in preparation. Someone decided that waste water from the process could be safely stored in those pontoons, so they removed the watertight caps. There was a big storm in late November 1990 which flooded the pontoons and sank the bridge. IIRC, that also damaged the cable supports for the replacement bridge, closing it down for a while.
I am, and I appreciate the correction to my dates. I really have it etched in my mind that the bridge sinking (you could see it from my home at the time, in Leschi) was tightly coupled to election stuff.
it's great to hear about these kinds of hidden dangers (immortalized by a wordsworth poem no less), but based on what's stated in the article, the sign shown in one of the photos seems to make the mistake of exhorting without informing (and persuading):
> "danger. this pool is very dangerous. submerged rocks. diving, jumping & swimming prohibited."
it seems it should say something more like
"danger. hidden, swift undercurrents will pull you under and trap you to certain death. avoid the water."
but maybe that one pool only has submerged rocks as a danger, and not undercurrents. even so, it could be more informative: "danger. hidden shallow submerged rocks make diving, jumping & swimming here deadly." but that makes the inclusion of swimming puzzling.
I’m wondering if the languages reflect who has died there?
Spanish and Mandarin make sense based on SF demographics, but the Russian (?) seems out of place. Although I know the Outer Richmond has a good size Russian population.
But if you at what languages SF offers information in, it usually also includes Japanese, Tagalog, Vietnamese and others, so I’m curious why they aren’t included.
It is indeed Russian and Russian people have a culture of enjoying swimming, sometimes combined with consumption of the alcohol. Combined with the fact that in Russia swimmable seas do not have rip currents, I would not be surprised if Russians disproportionately contributed to the sad statistics.
yes, that's better, but in that case, it's about possible death (how possible?), rather than probable death, so it's (intentionally?) ambiguous.
it seems to lack information about when rip currents are most likely, and more to the point, the statistical likelihood of death from entering the water at all.
i'm personally not a strong swimmer so would avoid it anyways, but that information might more readily dissuade others by simply putting trust in the reader to make an appropriate life or death decision.
exactly, the sign's information is incomplete, so it's likely completely disregarded due to contrary social proof rather than through reasonable assessment.
rip currents apparently kill less than 100 people per year in the US (mostly weaker swimmers who panic).
Best is to turn on your head and understand the rip.
In most cases the rip is very narrow, like 2-5 meters. For an experienced surfer the rip is an extremely good thing, it's a free lift to bring you out to the surf. But inexperienced swimmers panick and try to fight the rip. You cannot fight the elevator, you just have to step out of it. And some rips make turns. You really can predict how the the rip flows by observing the coastline, the wind direction and the waves coming in. When I was surf instructor the most important thing was to explain how this works.
That depends. In some cases it's best to swim parallel to the shore. In other cases it's best to just tread water and let the current circulate you back to the beach.
Is that a cultural difference, such that the UK tone for "proceed and you may die" takes for granted (with, presumably, support from their legal system) that the reader is at fault if they ignore the phrasing used? The US is particularly vulnerable to lawsuits seeking vengeance, and spends a lot of time agonizing over phrasing that is defensible against both literate and illiterate people. So it could be possible that the phrasing is correct for the UK, but not for the US. I'm not sure, though!
I don't know about UK-US, but I think I've noticed a difference between the UK and Germany in this respect: in the UK the sign tells people that something is dangerous and gives some hint of why; in Germany it just says "Verboten" with no mention of the danger, which in the UK would seem to be highly negligent and asking for legal trouble.
Something that injures a burglar could equally well injure a police officer, a fire fighter, a representative of the water company, ... it's amazing how many people can legally enter private property without the owner's permission. Of course one should be allowed to assume that such uninvited visitors are cautious professionals so you don't have to make everything childproof, but if you're aware of a serious danger yet can't be bothered to put up a warning sign ... you'd better have good insurance.
"it's amazing how many people can legally enter private property without the owner's permission"
Scotland has 'right to roam' so we can wander about pretty much anywhere (with a few sensible restrictions) and there are actually very few signs at dangerous spots - I can only think of a handful. The idea that you would go onto someone else's land, have an accident and then blame the landowner seems a very strange idea to me.
The legal system of common law and tort is pretty similar. The _culture_, on the other hand, is very different; no culture of "ambulance-chasing" (although in recent years it's been seen for road accidents, pushing up the price of everyone's insurance). No history of huge damages awards for trivial things. Not the same anti-government culture; the stream is probably owned by the local council or the waterways authority.
It's human nature to (1) distrust authority, (2) assume that authority is generally more nannying and risk-averse than you yourself are, and (3) want explanations consistent with your understanding of how the world works.
Human nature would like to disagree with you about the nature of human nature.
;)
I bet a dollar that the environment - nurture, as opposed to nature - will have a huge impact on a persons attitudes and beliefs and behavior towards authority.
Imho vast claims about human nature should be backed up with some scientific or well-sourced evidence :).
I wonder about the second point. Is it human nature or a learned reaction we have because in our lives we experience authority as overly- cautious? First our parents, then our teachers, then the government (perhaps less so, depending where we live) are constantly telling us not to do things because they're dangerous even when odds of injury are relatively low.
The resurgence pool at Porth Yr Ogof (Wales) is another innocuous looking stretch of water in Britain with a sad tally of deaths associated: http://www.ogof.org.uk/porth-yr-ogof.html
'Another sinister danger in this cave is the resurgence pool, where the water leaving the cave is forced through a narrow passage, in doing so it has scoured out a 7 m deep pool with underwater ledges, this coupled with the strong undercurrents created by the flow of the water has made this the most dangerous location in any British cave. In this short section of cave 10 people have drowned all within the sight of daylight, the dangers here should not be underestimated, signs in the cave before the pool warn of the danger and direct you to alternative exits.'
It might be more honest and less surprising for the title to read:
"Offshore path through tidal flats has killed 100+ people"
I also recall another similar place in France where the path has small artificial posts/concrete piers built so that anyone caught out can climb to safety.
The one in France is the causeway to Noirmoutier island. It's a two way road that is impassable at high tide. At both ends, prominent panels display warnings, the current time and the time of the next high tide. Still, there are regular occurences of people that lose their cars and have to be rescued from the shelter poles, and, very rarely, worse.
Incidentally, it's about the same length as this 3 mile path, 4.2 km.
The article's assertion that it's unique in the world is misleading. There are many tidal causeways. I've personally driven across one in Northumberland that connects the mainland to an old monastic island.
Does it say it is unique? In any case, the path/track in the article is no causeway. Tidal causeways are indeed found in many places but this is a bit different. Causeways tend to go somewhere. This just a safe path through the flats.
At the risk of taking this even further off topic: It very much still exists, and I'd recommend against visiting while the pandemic lasts.
We went by, on holiday, a few weeks ago and the authorities simply crammed the entire place full of tourists. It felt like a BLM protest without angry people: every square meter had at least 5 people on it. Corona? Haha! Tourism income please. We ran away minutes after arriving.
Coming from NL, where authorities allowing that kind of madness would be front page news, this really baffled me. It seems that the French think that as long as you wear a face mask, nothing else matters.
I had just blindly assumed that the local authorities would limit parking (it's in the middle of nowhere, pretty much unreachable except by bus or car), or do some sort of reservation system, so tourist counts would be limited and people could keep their distance. Instead, the only sign of government presence were the four heavily armed police officers at the entrance, and they didn't give a damn either.
That said, just like looking at Paris from atop the Eiffel tower is a bad look because, well, no Eiffel tower, the Mont-Saint-Michel is best enjoyed from a distance. So maybe we didn't really miss anything except an overpriced crêpe-au-chocolat.
No, the causeway is there. His point is that it didn't used to be. It used to be a path that would vanish beneath rising tides daily, just like the one described in this post.
There's also a path through tidal flats to the island of Lindisfarne in extreme Northeast England. (There's also a causeway for cars although that is covered at high tide as well.) People do need to get rescued every now and then.
It's a great trip, but you need to time your visit to the tides or you'll regret it. My wife studied Old Germanic languages, so a visit to Holy Isle was a must-do. We stayed in a nearby inn so we could leave when the tide was running out.
If you're in the north-east of England it's absolutely a wonderful thing to do.
Lindisfarne was the beginning of a long distance walk on St. Oswald's Way connecting to a section of Hadrian's Wall. Fascinating part of the country although the section from the mainland from Lindisfarne back to the coast is one of the less interesting.
We just walked along the causeway. The timing with the tides was a bit tight when we were there and it made more sense to take the more straightforward route although it wasn't as "authentic" as taking the path through the tidal flats.
One day many, many years ago when we lived in inland Essex (we're not English) we decided to go to the seaside. Using our road atlas we headed to the blue. We never found the sea just lots of mudflats with no sea in sight. It was my first experience of such a coastline
Yeah, on the small scale road atlases anything up to mean high water is shown as "blue". On 1:50,000 ("Landranger") maps and larger maps those areas would be shown either as brownish (mud) or yellow (sand) with the mean higher water mark shown with a thick line and mean low water with a thin line. Blue essentially means "this bit is always water" (ie. it's below mean low water).
Maps in other parts of the world will show such places as darkish blue to indicate they are tidal. I prefer the Ordnance Survey way (but I am British).
Many moons ago I visited Jersey (the one in the English Channel). One of the many highlights was visiting La Corbière[1], a lighthouse only accessible via a causeway that is submerged at high tide[2, 3]. Fascinating place.
I live there now and it's great. If you return try the guided walk to Seymour Tower. I did a short blog post back in 2012 with photos, including the rescue tower halfway out. https://www.tombrossman.com/blog/2012/seymour-tower-walk/
TL;DR 30-40 foot tidal range. Sea level rises faster then walking speed at times, you really must pay close attention.
Things that look and feel like something you've done a thousand times, and may do a thousand times again with no danger. Except that sometimes, things can change very quickly.
There's a creek bed near me that dried out almost completely over the summer; usually there's some water flow and occasional shallow pools where small fish live. While it was completely dry, I wanted to walk as far downstream as I could. I woke up the Saturday morning I planned to do it to the sound of torrential downpour. As recently as that Thursday, there was no rain in the forecast. I can only imagine if the downpour was sudden, and a few hours later.
As it happens, after the downpour I went to see the creek, and it was flowing quite rapidly at a depth of about 3 feet, well more than enough to sweep someone away never to be seen again.
Flash floods 1) develop quickly 2) often in impassable terrain (upstream and downstream are your only options), and 3) often under "blue sky" conditions from distant of hours-old rain rain.
I think that a simple chain of small electronic signals could notice the flooding and spread the information to all the other signals in the chain downstream. People could see a small flashing red light chain and rush to the next safe exit. Providing the system with a few discrete metallic scales leading just up in strategic points would save lives.
This would not be difficult to design, just a sensor placed at 50cm high that would activate automatically when flooded) and could be implement discretely without ruining the landscape.
This type of system would actually be quite expensive. Detecting flooding requires some kind of "flood sensor". Is that a water sensor? What happens when it gets covered in mud? Is it waterproof? How's it powered? How does it transmit data? Where is it placed? What happens if it falls over?
A flood sensor is simple technology. Each WC in the planet has one. You just need a box, a wire, and a buoy attached to a rod. When the buoy starts floating the rod closes an electric circuit conveniently placed much higher than the highest flood.
Could be introduced in a tube drilled directly in rock for minimum visual impact. A system of an oiled hollow cylinder (buoy) inside a major tube, all placed in the drilled tunnel could move smoothly for a long time and return again by gravity after the flood as long as the drill left some empty space below (for mud evacuation purposes)
> How does it transmit data?
standard electric cable (for example), or wifi, radio... whatever appropriate for the area
> Where is placed?
The rod/buoy, At 50cm high or 1m high (or any appropriate value) in the upper parts of the cannon. This would avoid the problem of mud covering electronics also.
> What happens if it fails?
The system returns to the same point as it is currently: "This is dangerous, not guarantee, we recommend to hire a guide, do it at your own risk".
The difference is that in the meanwhile some lives could be saved, so would be an improvement over the current situation.
> How do we know if it fails
A final led at the starting (and end?) of the cannon could be arranged to turn off, for example. Trivial in design of electronic circuits.
It's not easy to get up at an embankment. Mud and a 10-20mph current of water (water's heavy) pushing you away. Unless a root of a tree to grab on to, or a really solid rock, very hard and getting into the situation best avoided at all costs.
Maybe creeks are different where you're from, but as a young individual in the US northeast the idea of being "swept away never to be seen again" by a creek is a bit comical, torrential rain or not. You'd make it about a few yards before hitting one embankment or other and clamber out. Cold and wet, sure, but certainly to be seen again.
By the way, it is sunny overhead. The water is coming from a torrential downpour some miles away in the mountains. This is normal in New Mexico which experiences highly localized heavy downpours during July/August.
To point out the reason. In the northeast a small creek represents a small drainage area. In the Southwest a small dry creek can represent a large drainage. All the water dropped by a thunder storm will end up in it.
I remember one time flying over the southwest with the light just right and you could see vast drainages with thin thin cracks that are the actual channels cut down into the sand stone.
Indeed, in the South West, flash flooding carries families away occasionally. This year we've had exceptional fires, and the drainage from burn scars often carries what used to be a forest along with it. I don't know about GP's situation, obviously, but there is definitely a spectrum of intensity with regard to sudden water flows.
I love that phenomenon, that this was simply a way down to the Doggerland plains once. Probably hundreds, maybe thousands, of hunters, gatherers and anglers. They've specifically found wooden fish hooks, perhaps showing that as the sea levels rose people were constantly fishing along the new coast line.
By the way, I wonder if there is something about liability in English law that enables this to continue to stay open and posted as a path?
I would imagine that in the US, liability would quickly force local government / whoever to take down the signposts, as they "entice" people to think there is a safe, established path and should risk their lives and are probably somewhat liable for the result.
I guess there aren't many places like this in the US, so it's hard to say whether there's a similar case. Maybe the Grand Canyon or something. Or off-slope skiing.
Historical British footpaths do actually have legal protections. Rights of way[0] belong to the people and are public property. Here's a Tom Scott talking about it (kinda)[1]
Rights of way are legally protected, but are not necessarily public property. Footpaths and bridleways often cross privately owned land, especially in rural areas.
My last house came with two separate titles: one for the house and grounds, and one for just the footpath that lead up to and past it. I had literal nightmares when selling it that one the day of exchange the buyer would refuse to take the footpath title, leading to me being in a different country but legally having to maintain the passability of a footpath back in the UK.
The UK foreshore is owned by the Crown, except for some cases where it has been sold off. These are the minority though. If anyone else owns this it's likely to be the Ministry of Defence.
Natural features of the land do not, in general, create liability.
Besides which states can't be sued except where their own laws allow it. Lawsuits over riptides on beaches or falling off the edge of mountains are not successful.
There has also been a crackdown by state legislatures over high-risk activity suits and injury during commission of a crime suits. In most states you can't sue the slopes/resort for breaking your leg while skiing, nor can a burglar sue a property owner for any reason whatsoever (because the injury occurred during the commission of a felony).
AFAIK the federal government also doesn't permit lawsuits over injuries in national parks or other such wilderness areas - not that you're likely to succeed. You knew or should have known hiking on the edge of the Grand Canyon is a high risk activity.
There are areas in the US--e.g. on the Lost Coast of California--where you can be trapped by tides.
I'm not sure I agree in general though. There are tons of places in the US where you have hard to follow trails (and even roads) that aren't really maintained--especially in certain seasons.
About one tourist a week dies in Hawaii doing touristy stuff. Mostly snorkeling, but occasionally hiking or climbing on rocks near the ocean. My recollection was that in Maui there was a mix of dangerous areas with warning signs and dangerous areas with no signage at all.
It’s covered in TFA - the warning signs be passed at the start exonerate the landowner from any liability. Common to see this kind of thing at gates to farm land and such.
EDIT I’m not English. In Ireland we have a similar legal system and under the “occupier’s liability act” I believe it’s called, once you display these signs prominently you are off the hook. Obviously, I am not a lawyer and this is merely my hazy take on things.
Cancelling a public right of way is not easy. If it were, most of them would have disappeared years ago because land owners don't usually appreciate them being there. By the sound of it, the current signage is hardly enticing. But it's an interesting question whether someone might potentially be liable.
But the government are trying to get all rights of ways registered on a definitive register by 2026. If it isn't on the list, it won't be recognised as such.
There is a high likelihood that a lot of customary rights of ways will miss the deadline.
This sounds rather important. I hope that draft versions of this definitive register will be published online so that the general public can easily check for omissions.
The reverse is true though. If a non-right of way is used as one for long enough then it can be designated as one. This is why landowners instead designate them as permissive paths and close them for one day per year.
I’m not sure it’s entirely heightened US liability. I’ve been to a few places in the US (New Mexico Pueblos) where there is a serious risk of falling, yet no signs at all.
Up here in the north east of the UK is Holy Island, a small island off the coast with a village that has a population of about 200 people. The causeway to get there is cut off from the mainland twice a day too. A few times a year a hapless visitor gets their car swept out to sea.
First time I ever saw tidal flats like this was in Maine this past summer. We stayed at an RV campground in the mid coast, and the tide was out by several miles. Kids and I walked out a ways enjoying the little pools, but the tide did come in fairly quick and I had to encourage them to keep moving and not dawdle on the way back. We live in NJ so our previous experience was just sandy beach. The variety of different kinds of coast in Maine was a lot of fun.
I've kitesurfed near the Broomway. Really nice stretches of flat water when you get it right, but the tide comes in at a scary speed - or you have a 45 minute walk to get to the water - if you're there at the wrong time. I've also had some hairy moments where I've jumped high and realised I really had to stick the landing as the water was only a few inches deep.
As with most dangerous tides, it's not the height of the tidal change that's the problem it's the fact that it's very flat that means it comes in so fast.
Many visitors to the Southern UK are surprised by the ferocity and height of the tides here. The harbour where I live effectively becomes a fast flowing river twice a day, and the height of the water varies by 30 feet or more. It is not uncommon for the boats with the smallest engines to be unable to make headway against it.
Corryvreckan (Scotland, but still) has one of the fiercest tidal races in the world - the story goes that George Orwell almost drowned in one of the whirlpools.
'Although not, as is sometimes believed, formally classified by the Royal Navy as unnavigable, the nearby Grey Dogs, or Little Corryvreckan, are classified as such.[1] The Admiralty's West Coast of Scotland Pilot guide to inshore waters calls it "very violent and dangerous" and says "no vessel should then attempt this passage without local knowledge". Experienced scuba divers who have explored the waters have described it as "potentially the most dangerous dive in Britain"'
Just over half of this "path" is actually a public byway which means you have a right to traverse it by motorcar or any other method (horse and cart, bicycle etc.).
I am fascinated by tidal areas. The tide is (or should be) a familiar feature to any British holiday maker. Many of our nicest beaches are completely submerged at high tide, such as Tenby. At low tide beaches are revealed allowing safe passage to islands which were cut off only hours before. Conversely, some beaches are nicer at high tide. The low tide at Weston-super-Mare leaves a mile of treacherous mud in place of the sea.
But these flats are the most fascinating of all. On first glance these areas can seem boring: vast stretches of mud, sand and saltmarshes with just a glimpse of sea right in the distance. But it's treacherous and mysterious. Apart from the odd samphire picker, nobody comes out here. Twice a day the landscape is utterly transformed by the tide. And it happens so quickly.
I recently visited a favourite place of mine in The Wash. There are two artificial islands here that were built as a failed experiment to build a freshwater reservoir. The smaller of the two is accessible across the saltmarshes which are usually dry. The path used to be a causeway, but these days the whole marsh is above mean high water spring. The larger island can only be reached by crossing the perilous mud flats at very low tide. But it's riddled with deep tidal channels and quicksand. Legend has it King John lost his treasure out here as his baggage carts were consumed by the rising tide.
On my recent visit I decided to go at a very high tide. The highest of the year. I expected it to be more fun as the island would be more like an island, but I didn't expect the saltmarshes to be completely flooded (even though this is well known by locals, and now me). We decided to wade across anyway. The water was knee deep and I was carefully looking out for tidal inlets. As the tide was now receding, these inlets begin to flow outwards like a river, and with enough force to carry you with them. I felt confident enough only because I'd been here before. We reached the island now an hour after highest tide. Within another hour the sea recedes enough to reveal bizarre looking fingers of water formed by the never ending tide as it gently washes in and out like clockwork every 6 hours.
When you read tide tables for an unfamiliar area the numbers don't really mean much, other than one is higher than the other. But think about it: a metre of water. That's how much higher the tide was on that day. If you live in a flat area just imagine how much would be covered with an extra metre of water. It's scary. But fascinating.
> The island's name is derived from the Old English fugla-næss, with fugla (modern "fowl") meaning "of birds" and naess being the Germanic word for promontory
I had the same experience and was thinking it was strange. Surprising the BBC wouldn’t be testing for this kind of thing. Wonder if they’re subverting adblockers deliberately?
I’m thinking it could be an overinclusive block list. Although putting your good content in the same place you serve your ads (same cdn, and/or same html element) could be a good way to discourage adblocking.
The Bulge was infamous for traffic accidents where you suddenly had to swerve right then left then right at highway speed, with narrow lanes lined with concrete walls. This was a challenge for my old car with its loosey goosey suspension. I remember news radio at the time would report on another "flamer" at The Bulge.
Time moves on, and it was time to replace the bridge with a modern, safe one. The construction crew was astonished to find a car at the bottom where the highway abruptly ended when the bridge was retracted. In it was a woman who had been missing for 20 or 30 years. It was a famous case when she went missing, and people searched everywhere for her, including forests where psychics claimed she was.
Apparently, she was simply driving one night, didn't realize that the bridge was out, drove through the barrier into the water and nobody noticed.