1/28: Truck stopper

[Undertoad]

In this demonstration, California troopers show how an utterly cheap device could allow the authorities to force any truck's airbrakes on by tapping a special bumper.

(Well, not just the authorities, but anyone who knows it's there.)

Full story: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...28/MN37186.DTL

[verbatim]

Very big potential for abuse. That probably why it will fail. But stopping after hitting it seems harder when you have to stop before you rearend it. And couldnt you just poke it with a big stick to make it go off? this could be lots of fun.

It'll stop that huge truck in 100 feet or less... and the cop then slams into it

They say it can only be done with a special technique that cops will be trained in - uh huh.

[juju]

Some people just have no comprehension of how "security through obscurity" doesn't work. It will be funny to see them try to implement this, and then be surprised when everyone finds out how it works.

[Torrere]

Yay! - I don't live in Cali =]

I can image someone rear ending a semi and creating a huge sprawling traffic jam.

If implemented, I can also imagine it happening several times by accident. Of course, they're going to figure out how it works quite quickly.

[Nothing But Net]

Yeah, those 18-wheelers are such a major threat on the highways.

Whatever happened to just shooting out the tires?

Don't think I want to be near a gasoline truck when this bitch malfunctions...

[jaguar]

YOu really wnat a 18wheel tanker with a few thousand liters of fuel jackknifing across the roiad, tuning over and grinding alone it for 100m? hitting tons of other cars in teh process?

[SteveDallas]

Originally posted by juju2112
Some people just have no comprehension of how "security through obscurity" doesn't work. It will be funny to see them try to implement this, and then be surprised when everyone finds out how it works.

You said it! I still remember the time when the students where I work were connected to the same PBX as the faculty & staff (a setup I inherited) and I asked, "aren't we worried that students will give out our 800 number and people calling them can dial it and put the student's extension in and make the call on our dime?" The response was basically, oh, nobody will ever think of that.

So how big were the bills for it?

[SeanAhern]

The worry was that a terrorist could use a large tractor-trailer truck to take down a bridge by filling it with explosives and detonating it either near the anchor points for a suspension bridge's cables, or on the bridge itself. Especially worrisome are the seven bridges across the San Fransico Bay.

So California authorities asked <a href="http://www.llnl.gov">Lawrence Livermore Lab</a> scientists to see if they could come up with anything. Consultant Bill Wattenburg came up with the "Truck Stopping Device", which just uses the normal brakes of the truck to stop it.

You can read more about it here: <a href="http://www.llnl.gov/llnl/06news/Employee/articles/2001/11-30-01-truck.html">http://www.llnl.gov/llnl/06news/Empl...-01-truck.html</a>

And there's more here including a video of it in action: <a href="http://www.chp.ca.gov/html/truckstoppingdevice.html">http://www.chp.ca.gov/html/truckstoppingdevice.html</a>

They didn't mention a lot about practical jokers setting this thing off. They did have this to say, though:
<blockquote>
In case of accidental deployment, truck drivers can repair or reset the device to normal operating position in about 15 minutes. However, this cannot be done from within the truck’s cab. The driver would be required to leave the cab and walk to the rear of the truck, allowing law enforcement access to the driver.
</blockquote>
I'm skeptical that we'll see people ramming their cars into trucks just to see this go off. They'd pretty much kill their own cars, thus giving themselves up the in process. I think things like this would land them in the "stupid criminal" bin.

[CharlieG]

Originally posted by SeanAhern
The worry was that a terrorist could use a large tractor-trailer truck to take down a bridge by filling it with explosives and detonating it either near the anchor points for a suspension bridge's cables, or on the bridge itself. Especially worrisome are the seven bridges across the San Fransico Bay.

...snip

Oooh - so the terrorist is going to be DUMB? How hard would it be to bypass this? A few plumbing fittings? Folks, to load up a trailer will take time, so you spend the extra hour and bypass the dump valve, or even weld the bumper so it can't move

GAD, this is clueless

That video is cool. Until the truck driver is going 100 miles per hour and swerving and the cop has to nail him and then slam on the brakes to avoid hitting him.

Also, who's to say that the terrorist won't detonate that fucker after he's stopped? You're going to need a suicidal cop to go up there and do it. I know many people are :whofarted eager to stop terror and say that they'd risk themselves to stop a terror incident, but how many do you really think will actually do it? I'd hit that thing and then do a U turn and speed off like a crazed idiot. That is, providing he didn't detonate it when i got up close.

[snagglefish]

and who's to say they just won't bring a truck from out of state in...? would this be a california-only regulation....?

and as for 'vandal and tamper proof'....? give it to some engineering students at half a dozen different schools, and that thing will be disabled within the day.

what i was most surprised to hear was the VP of the trucking assoication (or whatever it was called) expressing support for 'taking it to the next stage.'

let's hope that next stage is its death.

[russotto]

It took Lawrence Livermore Labs to come up with this? The thing about a truck's air brakes is that they operate when NOT pressurized. That makes forcing them on pretty simple.

The people worried about deliberate or accidental activation are right on -- imagine your bad guy "accidentally" rear-ending a half-full gasoline tanker on, say, the PA turnpike. Instant jackknife, roll, gasoline spill, fire, maybe explosion.

Now forget about him and consider all the idiots who might REALLY accidentally rear-end a tanker, changing a minor incident that the tanker driver might not notice into a major disaster.

As for tamper proof... uhh, yeah, right. Close off and bypass the lines that lead to the device, and it does nothing to the air brakes. Mechanical emergency brakes? If you're a terrorist, just remove them entirely.

[SteveDallas]

Originally posted by dhamsaic
So how big were the bills for it?

We never ran exact numbers. Since my boss at the time (the COO) said we shouldn't worry about it, I just sat on it till I had a boss more sympathetic to killing the system we had, and used this issue as one of several justifications. But all you had to do was look at the 800 service billing for a weeknight evening or a weekend, and know that almost every call there was NOT coming into a faculty or staff office, except perhaps for the occasional brief voice mail.

Well, sorry, back to the topic, I forgot to ask: Can somebody clue me in about this nationwide epidemic of non-stopping trucks that this device is responding to? Or is it another case of a problem in search of a solution?