People don't seem to realize how much lifting force gets put on a mattress or
box springs when a pickup is driving at any kind of speed. Those things need to
be tied securely. They're amazingly aerodynamic. And yet I keep seeing them
being hauled with no tie-downs at all.
I started checking mattress
tie-downs on pickups after one suddenly lost three mattresses right in front of me
on I-5. They scattered suddenly from the truck bed, like blown-on dandelion
fluff. One flew to the lane to the left of me and one flew to the lane to the
right of me, but the third was 85% in my lane. Even if there hadn't been traffic
right behind me, slamming on the brakes wouldn't have kept me from hitting it. I
just slowed and gritted my teeth, wondering what it would do to the
car.
Then a semi passed me in the right lane. Its wheels hit the corner
of the mattress that was in its lane and flipped it like a tiddly-wink out of my
lane and into the left one. The mattress that was fully in its lane turned out
to be a box spring. It splintered and the bits bounced crazily.
I was saved. The semi and I drove
on, with traffic coming to a standstill behind us.
The pickup slowed and
got to the right, but there wasn't a good shoulder to pull off onto. So they
just looked at the remains for a couple of beats and started driving again,
with two unsecured mattresses (or box springs) still in the back.
Watch out for pickups hauling mattresses.
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