Unusual debris sightings on the interstate

[Zzonkmiles]

Interstates everywhere are littered with shredded tires and the occasional roadkill. Some interstates have more interesting debris, such as toys, 2 by 4s, or bags full of trash. My question is, what is the most unusual bit of highway trash or debris you have ever seen on an interstate highway?

For me, it would have to be a tie between a box of unassembled furniture and rolls of toilet paper. With the furniture, I was coming home from the Ikea store in Charlotte, NC, and merging onto I-85 when I had to swerve to dodge a box of furniture that had some of its components strewn over the road. I immediately realized that someone who had bought a shelf or dresser from Ikea failed to secure it properly in their truck or car or SUV and it unfortunately fell out onto the road in the lanes of traffic.

The toilet paper thing was totally random. It wasn't just one roll of TP, but rather at least 20 rolls that were unraveled all over the travel lanes and intertwined with the barrier in the median. It almost looked like some sort of college prank.

Hmmmm, now that I think about it, I also saw a leather sofa on the side of the interstate a few months ago too. No idea how that ended up there.

Any unusual garbage/debris finds in your interstate driving experiences?

[Alex]

A loveseat sofa in the middle of a travel lane, twice (once in 2007 and once earlier this year) on Interstate 75 in the Tampa area.

[OCGuy81]

I once saw a full drum set sitting on the shoulder of the 22 freeway.  Nice one too.  Either somebody left it behind, or there was about to be an impromptu concert on the freeway I was unaware of. 

[1995hoo]

Weirdest one: A truck hauling cans of Budweiser overturned on the old left-side ramp from the Inner Loop of I-495 to westbound I-66 on July 31, 2008. The cans of beer spilled all over the hill on either side of the overpass, many of them burst open, and the area absolutely stunk of stale, skunked cheap beer by the time we passed through a few hours later. Damndest thing seeing all those beer cans all over the place, but it's the smell I remember the most. We've all smelled stale or skunked beer any number of times, of course, but think about the smell of a whole truck full of beer when the beer is exposed to the hot summer sun for several hours. (The reason I recall the date is that I remember we were driving home from Portland, Maine, the day this happened, and that means it had to be July 31, 2008, the last day of our trip to Nova Scotia via the ferry that ran between Portland and Yarmouth. Almost home and we encounter the slow traffic followed by the stench of the stale beer!)

I thankfully did not actually see this myself, but as I drove by I saw the backup it caused: A box full of nails fell off a truck on a cloverleaf loop-around ramp leading from US-50 to I-495 in Virginia. The box smashed open when it hit the road and the results were quite predictable. (Not the same day as the beer incident.)

I remember my father somehow running over a wastebasket on the Baltimore Harbor Tunnel Thruway (the road now posted as I-895) when I was a little kid.

[agentsteel53]

I've called 911 for road hazards twice.  once was in the middle of the night, a car parked, lights off, in the #1 travel lane on I-680, just around a bend.  I had to swerve hard to avoid it.

the other time?  on CA-152, just before the top of the pass heading westbound, there was some kind of large industrial equipment.  I described it to the operator as "about the size of three large refrigerators lying down side by side".  no idea what it was, but it would have been a terrible collision if someone hit it.  luckily it was in the daytime and there was good visibility, so everyone was going around it.

I once dragged a washing machine off the center stripe on two-lane CA-111.  that one I could take care of with a friend and there was no need to call for the professionals.

[1995hoo]

agentsteel53's comment prompted me to think of another: A stop sign assembly lying in the road very late at night one night. I was coming back from a football trip to Charlottesville in 1999 or 2000 and I was almost home when I crested a hill and I thought something didn't look right up ahead. I slowed down, pulled over, and put my flashers on....and some guy behind me came flying over the hill, sailed ahead, and smashed into what I had seen (massive loud bang....I don't recall hearing brakes screeching, either). It was a full assembly, wooden pole with stop sign and standard rectangular VDOT route number signs. The guy fucked up his car pretty badly and I almost pissed myself with relief that I'd been going slower and spotted it. There but for the grace of God.....  We removed the sign from the road and I headed on my way after giving him my contact information in case his insurance wanted a witness. Never heard anything else about it.

I have to think some kids knocked that sign down and put it there on purpose. It was too far from the nearest corner to have landed in the middle of the road by accident. The nearby intersection is a T that did not (still does not) have an all-way stop. I've always assumed some kids were playing mailbox baseball and got "lucky" that this whole assembly fell over and that the little pricks then decided to do something really nasty.


Edited to add: Obviously this was not on the Interstate, but I don't think that matters.

[freebrickproductions]

Not on an interstate (haven't seen anything too weird on the interstates here), but there is a couch that's starting to decay off to the right hand side of the south-bound lanes of US 231 once you get across the Tennessee River but before you enter Lacey's Springs.

[hbelkins]

I've seen more than a few ladders in the roadway.

[andrewkbrown]

A box, marked "This Side Up" with the arrow pointing down to the pavement.

[Jardine]

My mom and sister drove through offal from a leaking truck from a packing house.

They could see stuff in the road, but failed to realize quickly it was viscera.


Yes, the tires kicked quite a bit of up into the undercarriage of their car.





the horror, the horror . . .

[6a]

I once saw a dining room table, right side up, in the middle lane of Independence Blvd in Charlotte. 

When I lived in Atlanta someone told me you could decorate a house by taking a lap around 285.  Can't say I disagree with that.

[briantroutman]

When I lived in Atlanta someone told me you could decorate a house by taking a lap around 285.

I remember KYW in Philadelphia did a radio promo titled something like "Extreme Makeover: Expressway Edition"  which was a compilation of some of the household and home improvement stuff they had actually reported being in the road during traffic updates–like a couch, a load of plywood, a desk, paint cans, kitchen cabinets...

[US81]

I've come upon the occasional cattle truck or horse trailer mishap. I've heard a few bad stories, but am lucky to have only seen the funny ones: the (not visibly injured) cows just wandering aimlessly on I-20 or the horses that, once loose, took themselves to the median or or the pasture alongside the road.

[Zmapper]

FedEx boxes from a double trailer.

[Eth]

Tires in the road are pretty commonplace, of course, but on my way home a few weeks ago I saw one merrily bouncing down the middle of the southbound carriageway of I-285, high enough into the air for me to be able to see it traveling northbound.

[Pete from Boston]

For a while in the 90s on the ramp from the Washington Bridge to I-95 going toward the George Washington Bridge, there was, off to the right side under the overpass, a stove.

It just sort of decayed there for a while.  There was a van bench seat, too.

If you spent much time around there during a period of about twenty years leading up to that, you saw a lot of debris on the road all the time.  When things were at their worst, the cleaners-that-be couldn't even keep up with the abandoned cars, much less the odds and ends.

[Roadrunner75]

I've dodged tires, furniture, trash cans, PVC pipe flying off a truck at me, and recently two guys frantically trying to get a giant professional grade outdoor grill out of a travel lane on the Garden State Parkway and over a guiderail (no shoulder).  A number of years ago on US-22 (former I-78) north of Allentown, PA I passed a car in the opposing left lane late at night right on the other side of the concrete barrier sitting on its roof (but otherwise perfectly aligned in the lane as if it decided to park there, lights off  -  upside down).  Also had to stop to avoid hitting a peacock once (probably an escapee from the Popcorn Park Zoo, which was a few miles away).

[GaryV]

Not unusual, but it is perplexing.  I'm always amazed at the number of shoes seen along the roadways.  How do you manage to take off your shoe and toss it out the window?   

[sdmichael]

As an Adopt-A-Highway volunteer since 1998, I've seen many things. The oddest was either the dead dog in a bag or the empty vial of medical marijuana on I-5 in Grapevine Canyon.

[Zzonkmiles]

Not unusual, but it is perplexing.  I'm always amazed at the number of shoes seen along the roadways.  How do you manage to take off your shoe and toss it out the window?   

My guess is that some people like to stick their feet up on the dashboard and the wind catches their sandal or something and blows it out. But I really have no idea.

[Arkansastravelguy]

Does a drunk girl passed out in middle of the road count?

[Arkansastravelguy]

Oh, the Nashville thread reminded me of one. Driving home to NC after my fathers funeral was the great Nashville flood. I hit 24 just in time to see the school floating down the highway...

[CentralCAroadgeek]

Driving home from Phoenix with my uncle over 4th of July weekend and we passed by tomatoes on I-5 north in the Central Valley spilled by a truck obviously, carrying tomatoes. Surprisingly, all of the tomatoes were on the right shoulder and none seemed to go past the rumble strip.

It was also very slow stop-and-go traffic on I-5 there, predictable on holiday weekends. (It was my first time experiencing this kinda traffic on this part of I-5, by the way)

[signalman]

A traffic cone with a black base laying on its side in the middle of a travel lane.  It was at night; making the black base difficult to see.  It also didn't help that I was sneezing just prior to encountering it.  I opened my eyes from sneezing and had a split second to slam on the brakes and jerk the car into the left lane to avoid it.  Fortunately it was late at night and I was the only car around.  Still, I must have missed that cone by inches.

[DandyDan]

One time when I was driving to Des Moines from Omaha on I-80, I saw a mangled bicycle, which must have been poorly secured to a pickup and just fell out.   That's not the only mangled bicycle story I have, because I was driving up to Fremont on US 275 for my old courier job (before the current freeway was built) and saw a pickup truck lose a bike and it hit the car right in front of me.  I wouldn't have wanted that to come flying at me.