This day in history: Semitruck wedges under train viaduct downtown. Sheriff warns motorists of liability for ‘hooking’

From 1976: One particular problem is not new in Spokane: vehicles stuck under overpasses.

On this day 50 years ago, two lanes of traffic were blocked after a semitruck and trailer became wedged beneath a railroad viaduct on Post Street between First and Second avenues.

“I’ve measured her as high as 13-feet-2, but she would have gone through if she’d been full,” the driver said.

The sign on the overpass stated the maximum height at 12 feet.

Two motorists helped the driver “figure out how to release air from the cushion shock bags under the front of the trailer and to let air out of the tires until the truck was low enough to scrape its way out.”

From 1926: The Spokane County sheriff warned motorists they would be liable for an accident if they took part in “hooking.”

Hooking?

This was the dangerous practice of pulling a sled with a vehicle. The sheriff said that “as many as four or five sleds have been hooked on one automobile.”

The auto drivers were not always complicit. Some drivers complained that sledders hooked onto their cars without their knowledge.

The sheriff also cited another problem. Drivers on some hills had been “forced to stop their cars and pull off the road by coasters coming down the hill four and five abreast.”

Also on this day

(From onthisday.com)

1887: Ground is broken for the Eiffel Tower in Paris, beginning the landmark’s construction for the 1889 World’s Fair.