Burn Baby Burn

Safety is a bit of a misnomer here... we've regressed to just chuckling at what used to make us seethe. Just the other day I was driving down one of the busiest roads in the country, and happened to pull up next to a semi flat bed trailer with full tanks of a mysterious liquid. Upon closer inspection, I saw the letters in bold 'HCL' (suspenseful music please)... yes for those of you who flunked High School Chemistry, that's Hydrochloric Acid!
Yes, that truck has 38,000 liters of HCL sloshing down the highway for all to see, and no one seems to care. The thing that makes me chuckle (what used to make me seethe), is that the tanks aren't secured and the valves are easily accessible and unlocked. Just a simple twist of the valve opens a 2" outlet at the bottom of a 1000 liter tank. I thought I could maybe reach one from the passenger side of my car window! What if a child got curious, what if the truck got in an accident? Ahh, that'll never happen.

Then there's the incessant smoking. The other day I stopped at our local bakery, where apparently their gas fired oven ran out of fuel. The gas truck was parked outside filling up the tanks through a hose to the inside, while both of the gas truck dudes stood by and smoked. I could see and smell the fumes rising, while a dozen fire-ball explosions from movie scenes flashed before my eyes. Is there no concern for even your own safety, let alone all the pedestrians walking by? The only ones with worried faces were the crazy foreigners who stayed on the extreme other side of the sidewalk. Ahh, no big deal.
I won't pretend I'm better or think I have all the answers, but if common sense is so common, why don't more people have it? I'm back to my chuckling, Hehe.