It was an impressive and seemingly unusual image: 13 tractor trailers lined up shoulder to shoulder under an overpass on an otherwise empty stretch of interstate.
Making it even more compelling was the fact that drivers had positioned their trucks in the wee small hours of Tuesday on I-696 in Huntington Woods near Detroit to help the Michigan State Police foil a man’s suicide attempt.
It worked.
Afterwards, the troopers say they have relied on good samaritan truckers to block jumpers like this for many years. Still, it impressed a lot of people. Like these folks whose comments showed up all over Facebook:
Brian Shidler: Gotta problem? Call a trucker. Always willing to help when possible.
Nona Alliene: Burnett WOW! Not surprising to me! Most truckers are decent folks!
Karen Miller: Happens all the time. Professional truck drivers get involved and help law enforcement in more ways you can imagine.
Mike Bixby: Working in the heavy trucking industry, this doesn’t surprise me. Most of the drivers I meet are really good people!
Marybeth Hall: Gotta love our truckers. The good ones are always there if someone needs help. We have seen them help others on our road trips and vacations!
Sally Foran: Truckers rock!!!
Chris Clausen: Way to go Michigan State Police and these caring drivers!
Diane Hobson: Thank you to the truck drivers for trying to save someone’s son, brother, father, uncle, grandson but a stranger to them. Again THANK YOU!!!!
Sandra Coppola: Truckers have big hearts and big rigs!
Cathleen Ducharme Hattin: Thank you … this gives hope for humanity that there is positive and goodness in everyone! What you all did was amazing.
Emma Burgess: Thank you to everyone who came together and helped save this man’s life! Drive safe along your travels to the truck drivers who stepped in
Christina Schuberth: Those truckers are great people! They just changed a life!!
Misty Cras:e 13 big big thank you’s to you truckers out there that helped save that person.
Kelly Ann: Love it something positive about truckers
Penny Gadbois: Thank you to all those wonderful truck drivers
Cheryl Joensuu: I applaud the truck drivers to save a life
Not surprisingly, it also turned out to be pretty good bait for the trolls. For example:
Mark Haynes: All due respect if dude took a header he probably would’ve been fine we’re talking about 30 feet.
Shawn Lytle: There are still some gaps. Dude gave up too easily
Mark Smith: That’s not even enough of a drop to kill urself lol drama queen attention seeker
Tommy Neigel: Let him do it. Just another nut job. Wait until he gets a gun.
Gail Cardner: He would only have to cross the street and jump from the other side …
Here’s how the story showed up across the internet.
There is some confusion with the photo taken this morning. This is not an MSP photo as we don’t share law enforcement tactics. This photo was taken by a photographer at @FOX2News that was also doing their job this morning at the scene. pic.twitter.com/ONlsDULGys
— MSP Metro Detroit (@mspmetrodet) April 24, 2018
