By Steven Symes 
Thanks to faster speeds, disaster on a highway can strike in an instant, as clearly shown in this traffic cam footage. The incident you’re about to watch happened on Interstate 65 in Birmingham, Alabama and shows how a traffic slowdown can become a pileup faster than you can blink.
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In the footage, we see traffic in the left lane on the far side of the interstate from the camera slow down. It appears someone ahead is traveling slowly, causing everyone else to slow as the number of cars in that lane builds to beyond what the other lanes have in the same stretch.
When anyone tells you driving slow or even at an okay speed in the left lane isn’t dangerous, have them watch this video. They’ll probably still try arguing with you because people who go slow in the fast lane are that way, but still.
That’s the first element of danger in the footage. The next is a semi-truck driver, who thankfully isn’t hauling a trailer, who doesn’t seem to see the slowdown until it’s basically too late. You can see the rear tires on the truck kick up all kinds of smoke as the truck driver hits the brakes, but he can’t slow the rig down in time.
Whether intentional or not, the truck swerves right, hitting a car that’s two lanes over, then a truck in the right lane. Thankfully, the collisions don’t domino to include more vehicles, likely because other drivers were attentive enough and didn’t panic, hitting their brakes instead of plow right into the mess.
This is why you always need to be checking the flow of traffic ahead, not only in your lane but in other lanes. Conditions can change in a hurry on the highway, so you need to be prepared to slow down, stop, change lanes, etc. at the drop of a hat.
Image via Heartland Reporter/YouTube