2009 Nov 30 Smog-Related Traffic Pileup
Seems it’s not just our lungs suffering from particularly poor air in Beijing recently. In a rare admission that the muck outside our windows isn’t just “fog,” the Global Times reported this morning a major traffic pile-up on Sunday as a result of heavy smog.
The report states: “The recent smog enveloping the city wreaked havoc when poor visibility caused a 10-car pileup in an eastern suburb Sunday morning, killing at least two and injuring more than 30. The accident occurred at around 7am on a stretch of the Beijing-Shenyang Express way near Tianfu Village in Tongzhou district. A westbound truck with Liaoning plates was rear ended by another truck, which was then hit by a bus coming from the same direction.”
The bus driver was reportedly killed, while the pile-up caused a “chain of accidents, resulting in more than 30 injuries and 23 damaged vehicles.”
While today is looking much clearer than last week’s shocking few days, the GT report concludes; “This year's longest sustained bout of smog, after suffocating the city all last week, is expected to linger into this week, the Beijing Meteorological Bureau reported.”
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Mary D
Re: Smog-Related Traffic Pileup
Bad visibility doesn't cause 23 car pile ups. Thats what fog lights are for.
Bad driving, following too close, passing on the shoulder/blind spots and driving in the dark with no lights on causes 23 car pile ups.
The only time a Chinese paper would blame smog is when the problem is due to a more serious government failure, like the complete lack of drivers education here.
Herbz
Re: Smog-Related Traffic Pileup
Correct!
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Nata
Re: Smog-Related Traffic Pileup
Come on - smog!!!! Only those who has never seen smog believe in such crap! Fog is fog - and to pass off these few days of mistiness and fogginess as smog is simply irresponsible....Beijing is not as bad as California. Smog has a light yellowish tinge and tends to rise above the horizon...
A 10 car pile up due to low visibiity is not unsual if people drives irresponsibly and do not know how to use their fog lights, or drive slower...
So whoever wrote this article, please do not insult the intelligence of those of us who have lived in other cities in parts of the western world ....
Stop blaming all troubles in China on air pollution - go back to wherever you are from if all you know to do is criticise China - I am not born here but I love this place - you either live with both the good or bad, or scam!!!
Jerry
Re: Smog-Related Traffic Pileup
If you think Beijing's recent bout of "fog" is merely condensed water vapor, then I can only but applaud your unsullied optimism. Do you ever look at the sky in Beijing? Did it occur to you that you can't see the "yellowish horizon" because it's obscured by all the "fog"?
I, too, love living in Beijing and and am, in fact, in California right now. But my withered lungs, constantly irritated sinuses and smokers' cough-(I don't smoke) can vouch for the fact that LA's infamous smog is nowhere near as bad as Beijing's, where the smog alert registered above "500" (emergency levels) last week and is at its best consistently at "Very Unhealthy" levels.
Take a look here on a daily basis and do the math:
http://iphone.bjair.info/
And what's with the knee-jerk defensiveness? Face it, China has a serious air pollution problem that my family and I have to live with and breathe in every day. I hardly think the writer is insulting anyone's intelligence by pointing out what's painfully obvious or "blaming all the problems of China on air pollution."
The shrillness of your tone (and obvious Chinglish grammar) belies your intentions - you by any chance affiliated with the coal industry?
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_fog_mixed_with_pollution
Jerry Chan, Editorial Director
danedwards
Re: Smog-Related Traffic Pileup
I'd also like to add I wasn't blaming anything - I was reporting what was said in a CHINESE paper by a CHINESE reporter. So telling the person to "go back to where they came from" is pretty lame.
Having said that, if you really think the smog in Beijing is as bad as many Western cities you're frankly deluded.
And since when did "loving" a place mean you cannot say anything about it that isn't 100% glowing. I come from Australia and like the place a lot - that doesn't mean I don't think my country has many problems or that I don't frequently voice so-called "criticisms" about some of the things that go on there.
Grow up - China has problems just like every other country in the world. And air pollution is one of the most serious.
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admin
Re: Smog-Related Traffic Pileup
Hey i think this comment wins as the most utterly ridiculous, uninformed -- no wait, deluded -- one i've ever read, in five years of administering this website.
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