Transportation securityHazmat trucks stopped in downtown Dallas

Published 12 May 2011

City of Dallas police are enforcing city laws prohibiting truckers from hauling hazardous materials through downtown Dallas; last week the police stopped twenty-seven trucks in downtown Dallas, carrying, among other things, cyanide, gasoline, and dynamite

Tankers carrying hazardous materials // Source: ehow.com

Sheriff’s deputies caught dozens of trucks illegally carrying very hazardous materials through downtown Dallas last week.

MyFoxdfw.com reports that Deputy Jerry Jones said he and other deputies from the Dallas Sheriff’s Office commercial vehicle enforcement unit stopped the trucks during a sting operation on the highway in the Downtown Canyon, on the southern side of the city.

One truck was carrying cyanide. Another was hauling gasoline. One tanker was filled with black powder, the kind found in dynamite. Jones said it was like a firecracker in that tanker.

“I couldn’t believe we had explosives going through the Canyon,” he said.

The trucks were not supposed to be there, dangerously close to a high population center. They are supposed to go around the city traveling on highways marked with HC in a green circle.

“It is shocking what goes through there and what could happen if you think about it,” Jones said.

Jones told MyFoxdfw.com that if one of the trucks somehow did get into an accident and catch fire, everyone within a half mile radius would have to be evacuated.

“If you believe in Murphy’s Law eventually something’s going to happen,” he said.

The deputies issued twenty-seven citations in three hours. Each driver was fined $300.