A Harrowing Narrowing Experience

A Harrowing Narrowing Experience

Next morning we all pulled up stakes from DeSoto State Park and drove west toward Memphis and the next square on our Candyland board - Hernando Point Public Use Area in Mississippi. Keith has a GPS unit that allows him to customize his trip parameters and he plugged in the height of his camping rig so we wouldn't encounter low clearance areas. That eliminated all fast food drive-thru lanes.

We were in Rogersville, Alabama, about to cross the Tennessee River, when we encountered a bridge built in 1937, which runs on top of a dam. The Wheeler Dam Bridge has a remarkable metal and panel rivet-connected polygonal Warren through truss at the start of the bridge. (see image, and thanks, Keith, for being a fellow nerd.) In addition to the bridge, there are locks present to facilitate boats getting from one side of the dam to the other. The whole complex is on the National Register of Historic Places. A real confidence builder.


The southbound approach to the through truss on the Wheeler Dam Bridge.
Note the sidewalk on the right. It's about 2 ft. wide.
 

 You will notice in the picture there is a screaming yellow clearance sign. No problem, both of our rigs are below 14 ft. And we trust Keith. And his GPS. With our lives.

The bridge sloped down after the initial "through" part of the through truss. Although the bridge was high enough, it didn't seem to be wide enough. Do you remember the song, "It's too late to turn back now" by Cornelius Brothers & Sister Rose? Yeah. 

The bridge is 20 feet wide. So that's 10 feet per lane, including the double-yellow line. And it has a sidewalk on one side - our side. Now, keep in mind that most highways are 12 ft. wide to accommodate 18 wheelers, which are 8 1/2 feet wide. Our camper is 9 1/2 feet wide. It looked to be as tight as our vacuum packed Food Saver Ravioli. I told Dave to just aim down the center of his lane and shut his eyes. 

 It's going well until... an aforementioned semi is approaching us. We're going south. He's going north. The ravioli is sucking in for all it's worth. Keith moved a hair to the right and sparks flew as his exhaust pipe scraped the sidewalk. Dave is white-knuckling the steering wheel. There is less than 2 ft. separating the truck and us. I don't know what Dave remembers, but this picture is what I remember.

 Reasonable facsimile of "our" truck.

  And then the truck passed. It was all in the past. But we couldn't breathe again until we were off the bridge. Later at lunch we had a nervous chuckle about the harrowing, narrowing experience. Keith lost 1/4 inch of the bottom of his tail pipe - it was ground off by the bridge's sidewalk. Dave and I were fortunate as nothing was broken, scraped, or damaged. Except our nerves. They may never recover.  

However, we were able to sleep well that night, and are rejoicing thankfully that God kept us safe on the bridge.


 

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