Well There‘s Your Problem - Episode 141: Schoharie Limousine Crash

Episode Date: September 21, 2023

folks, do not go in the stretch limo. your closest friends and family are lying to your face and also trying to kill you. Our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/wtyppod/ Send us stuff! our address: Well There's Your Podcasting Company PO Box 26929 Philadelphia, PA 19134 DO NOT SEND US LETTER BOMBS thanks in advance in the commercial: Local Forecast - Elevator Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

I am making a unilateral declaration of podcasting. Oh, good. A papal bull of podcast. Hey, papal bull of podcasting. What would we do this? I'm speaking, uh, uh, ex-custed. That's a big drop. Yes.

Ex-gaming chat. Yeah, the podcast. Yeah, that's a gavic chat. Uh, nice. Wait, what gaming chair are we rocking here? What do we talk about? Oh, we've got, uh, if you'll give me one second, it's like a knock. It's a fantasy lab. It's because I can see the clouds in a full secret lab. Yeah, no, not because I couldn't because they weren't in stock forever.

Uh-huh. I have a, I don't ever accuse you of not being able to afford something stupid. Right, I'm insulting you. I'm insulting the viewers. I'm insulting you. I'm insulting the viewers. I got a no-ball chair as one, which is like actual leather instead of the like a game of fake leather that like peels off is done to it. I don't think anything expensive could have Would have been in any better Nothing there would have held up now. You need like a cat proof gaming chat. I was about to say he's standing up like Right now, so like the cigarette is good for you the cat proof gaming chair These are the inventions that we need the inventions that we need science. Yeah, yes, yes.

You just get a solid steel chair or like steel a chair off a bus. That would probably do it. I think we can support that. I think we can make that a kind of another unilateral declaration. And if you want a good chair, steel one off of the steel one from the bus, yeah, onto the bus. Yes, the bus.

You can use it to unbolt out chair. And then if anyone tries to stop you, you have a socket wrench and they don't. So, you know, point, yeah. Right. It's genius. Brandishing a socket wrench against a cop. That's going to go well for you.

All right. This is the kind of thing that happens every day in woke San Francisco. Yeah. Um, okay. Welcome to, well, there's your problem. It's a podcast about engineering disasters with slides. I'm Justin Razznick. I'm the person who's talking right now. My pronouns he and him. Okay, go. I'm Alex Kultor Kelly, my pronouns are she and her. Yeah, Liam. Yeah, Liam. Hi, I'm Liam Anderson. I'm the person talking right now. My pronouns are he and him.

Oh, yeah. We got a photo here of like what all cars are going to look like after Joe Biden get to second term. Yeah, it used to be a Ford excursion, I think. This was once a Ford excursion, but you may notice it is longer than a normal Ford excursion. It's a depth of field. Someone has tried to shorten it apparently. Not very successfully.

So today we're going to talk about the worst transportation disaster in the United States in 2018, which involved a single limousine. Oh, yeah, I remember this. Holy shit. Yeah, this is, I mean, that's a crowded field too, because Americans, you love your car accidents and like, yeah, we go. We go. I want to be very clear about that. So today we're going to talk about the Scahari limousine crash in Scahari, New York. But first, we have to do the goddamn news. Oh, Jarring Shift in tone again. Yeah, Jarring Shift in tone. You know, 20,000 people are so...

Yeah, I've often wondered what would be the first city to be destroyed in modernity by climate change. And with 20,000 people dead out of a population of 90,000, I think, DERNA in eastern Libya may be sort of like gunning for the title. I was about to say, so the big, big floods in Libya killed a whole lot of people, wrecked a whole lot of buildings now looking good out there right now No, I would say so a disaster that you know, it is gonna get the full treatment from us in the fullness of time Right at some point we are gonna have to start catching up with our own news. I have some ideas on that But

Yeah, so baby. Yeah, we don we'd even have like the strong guiding hand of Gaddafi in these dark days. Well, the strong guiding hand of Gaddafi is part of why this happened because, uh, Libya, Ross. Yeah, Libya is kind of this like, there's, there's geopolitics here. Libya has only existed, like one country since 1951, and it was a, a kingdom for some reason after they kicked the Italians out. Um, but like, really it's two provinces, right?

Tripolitanian, Sirenek, Tripolitanian is the one with triplets, the one with all the stuff, it's the one with Gaddafi's whole patronage network, and then Sirenek is the one in the east that was like always rebelling against whoever was in charge of it. And so for decades, if not centuries, it's been massively under-invested. There's this seasonal river, the Ladi Derna, that runs through Derna, has two earth dams upstream in Bankland dams, which were built by the Yugoslavs in the Seven Seas. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Storm Daniel comes in, this unprecedented Mediterranean extra-tropical cyclone, dumps a shitload of water on them,

both of them over top, both of them break, and it just dumps the whole amount of like water into the city and just washes a bunch of it out to sea, which is, you know, what's happened while it's killed a bunch of people. Yeah, not a good situation there, not a situation you wanna be in, where you have dams overtopping.

See Central Valley, California in a few years. Yeah, and this is the kind of thing that like again, if you go into it, you can find people warning that this would happen for the last 30 years or whatever, also not held by the fact that in the Civil War, Durner changed hands like four times, including once to ISIS. held by the fact that in the Civil War, Derna changed hands four times, including one Stupisus. Yeah, it's now in the eastern sort of slightly more,

or even more military rule bit. And so, yeah, no, it's fucked. Whole things fucked. And of course, this is also having a great effect on migration, because Libya's an exit point across the Mediterranean for a lot of migrants, several hundreds of whom were killed, and then because there's a kind of like do-odd and all effect going on, because the people's muglers couldn't launch boats during the storm. After it, they all went at once, and so Lampedusa, the island of the south of Italy, their population went up by like 7,000 overnight.

Just because, yeah, there were more migrants than there were Italians on the thing. And yeah, this is why. So to be welcomed into this sort of bosom of Georgian Maloney's burgeoning fascism. So great, fantastic all around. Yeah, wonderful. I mean, maybe that's the one situation where the amount of migrants coming in and then you're just, you know, you're just, you know, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're just, you're, you're just, you things, as we always say, don't exist in a vacuum. And I personally have been in favor of whatever makes the vast majority of Italians unhappy.

Yeah, that's true. Well, if you're up to me, my dad would rule over Italy with an iron fist. Best we can do is like creeping Sharia. You know, we'll get that soon. It's always a situation where it's like, oh my God, there's a migrant crisis because 50 people show that. People gotta go to work, man. Yeah.

People have to go to work. Yeah. No borders, no nations, you gotta go to work. Sorry. Yeah. So the Mediterranean's just gonna be like more like this, which is cool, because it's getting hotter. It's like as hot as it's ever been, hotter in fact.

And you're just gonna get these situations where you get areas of like, fresher that are hemmed in by like, fronts on both sides, they could have an omega block because it's shaped like the lesser omega. Oh, cool, that sounds like a good way to die. Yeah, yeah, no, that just like,

generates the cyclone. And then it just bounces around, so it like killed like a dozen people in Turkey, dozen people in Greece, and then got to Libya and killed, you know, 20,000 people. And it's just gonna be like this from now on, I guess. Forever, right. Cool, cool, cool, cool.

More and more manufactured migrant crises, which are entirely manageable if you just gave people houses. I don't know, it's, it's like, or did less horrific interventions with no, you know, open ended bullshit. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, arguably it is downstream of like NATO intervention in the Libyan Civil War for sure. But yeah. Then again, maybe this would have happened to have the Libyan Civil War happened. And you know, I'm not going to cry any tears for good. Daffy being gone. It's just, it's all fucked. It's all fucked. I think it's what yeah, I feel about that. Well, yeah, it's like, like any any, like the, so the rising tide of climate change is going to

like immerse all the people who are already most precarious and already worse off. Yeah. Right. Yeah, I'm sure. Yeah. Okay, that is auto workers. It's on strike. Hey, this is epic. But did you guys see the fact that they did basic, not a false leg operation, but sort of a bogus army operation where they sent, they, they've misdirected the auto, the auto manufacturers. So redistribute the work to stretch up to plants that would be striking. Yeah, they, they, they read their Sun Siu, right?

And they rushed. Yeah, they fucked them. Yeah. Yeah. So United Auto workers is on strike for wage increases for return to traditional pensions. They're sort of starting out by striking a few plants and they're going to ramp it up as they go along. They are asking for a very steep wage increase

because previous leadership had sort of slacked off on wage increases over time. But now they're getting mad about it and they're trying to get everything that they deserve. So this is definitely very interesting. There's sort of this media narrative where they're trying to manufacture a conflict So this is definitely very interesting. There's sort of this media narrative where they're trying to manufacture a conflict between the union and electric vehicle policies and stuff like that.

There's also like, Trump is trying to build that up. Trump is actually going to go down to the picket line and Biden is not. So, yeah, I'd... Yeah, that's pretty funny. Most pro-union president in history. I like this guys run us on money. Yeah. One thing I will note is that I don't think Biden can directly end the strike. You know, he can't he can't do what he did to the railroad workers to these guys. You know, because this is an actual national labor relations board union and not a railway act union.

So, but it'll be interesting to see how this progresses. I hope the UAW gets everything they want. Obviously. Absolutely. Yeah, I just think it's very funny that they, they, they, they, to quote whoever said it to me in a message, when Temple was on strike, uh, pay up motherfuckers. Yeah, that's right. And one of the, one of the arguments that, uh, the automakers have put forward is, look, we need these lower wages so we can produce these massively subsidized electric vehicles. Uh, no, no, you don't suck my butt, suck my butt, the whole butt suck all of it.

Yeah, electric vehicles are a big political football in this one for whatever reason. I mean, you know, it's sad. Everyone, you know, $1,500 subsidy already. How is that not good enough? Yeah, well, it's because the union don't want to build electric vehicles because they're woke, you know? Yeah, obviously.

Well, obviously they're walking about. was the white working glass here, right? Yeah, what was the thing there? What am I supposed to do? So, um, yeah, this is a big deal, pretty big deal. You know, um, can we put like a strike fund in the description? We know we will say we'll do that and then we never remember to do that. Ross is going to be honest. I think this is one of those things like with the teamsters where they got, they got plenty of money already.

I think they find you know, the strike fund is not necessarily like to do money. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. If there is a strike fund, you know, I'd buy it. I'll find it.

I'll find it yourself. But it's what did Google? Yeah, what did it go? Put that money, put that money in the WGA and the WGA and and sag each your money more than the way you do. Like that's that's that's a strike. There's like having a bad time with. Yeah.

So, um, but anyway, yeah, this is, uh, this is, this is good. This is fun. I'm excited for this strike. I'm excited for automakers to bleed, um, you know, and not just because car bad, uh, workers good. Uh, it's going to be so fun seeing Trump down there. They said American Peron couldn't happen. They said it couldn't exist.

They were wrong. You know, I think I think crap is going to get food. I don't think these guys like Trump. I'm going to play as American Peron. They're going to kill myself. 20 years time. The Democrats are like, we're the party of like real Trump person. Yeah. Yeah. that's true. He's the next Reagan.

I literally like a little bit of a little bit of vomit came up, like a little bit. Well, well, we'll treat. We'll see. He's only American Peron if he wins. If he wins another term, he is. We'll see he's only American for one if he wins if he wins another term he is Even if he's especially if if he's if he's running from jail Yeah, yeah, definitely, but we'll we'll burn that bridge when we get to it. Mm-hmm So that was the goddamn news Okay, so we got to ask a question. What's a limousine? What is a limousine?

It's a region of France. It also, yes, however, yes. It's named after limousine. Oh, I had no idea. Yeah, yeah. All the stuff, like all terms for cars, basically from horse drawn coaches. So, Alimazan is like a coach with the driver, like fully outside with no protection over him because you're rich and fuck that guy.

Yes, exactly. And in early cars, like a limousine, like had no roof over the drivers, but like, because it's like a coach, right? And he doesn't, you know, why the fuck does he need that? Yeah, exactly. Fuck that guy in particular. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, so limousine, large luxury car designed to be driven by a chauffeur, right?

So appears here's a 1941 Lincoln of some kind. It's nice. It's a Soviet limousine over here. Nice. Yeah, exactly. It's used by, you know, government officials, rich people, VIPs, so on and so forth. You know, and for a long time, today, to a certain extent as well, limousines were built, you know, whole cloth at a car factory. But, you know, this is not necessarily the case now. You can't get like a packet to build you a limousine.

No, you gotta go. No, no, no. Packards. Coach built everything. Yeah. So a lot of limousines, until recently, really, we'll get into that later are what's called a stretch limousine, right?

Now, in order to discuss this, we have to talk about coach building, right? Back it in order to discuss this, we have to talk about coach building, right? Back it back again to the horse and carriage. Yeah. So there were a lot of these custom coach building companies for a long time, right? It's old-timey body on frame cars, right?

Sometimes you would just buy the frame of the car and the engine and you would go to a coach builder and you'd say, build a cool car on this, right? Like a like mosaic or whatever. I think Rolls Royce started doing this. And you can keep doing this. There are shops that do do this still. Yeah.

I said do do. Yeah. So yeah, there's still like a couple of shops that do this. There's like, there's someone that I want to say there's some company that just like builds Studebaker of aunties still We got like goose the Patreon are like monetize the YouTube or something good We need a company car, you know, we could get $7 a month We have a company car, you know, we could get $7 a month We have a company car

What you've done Oh the GCI yeah, the GCI is the company car. That's sure. Yeah So, you know, and you know custom coach building this the rich person thing is very complicated, right? But some people went ahead and did this This became more complicated with the advent of the unibody frame, right? You know, is this what I would call a monococ because I think that's a monococ, as well. Yeah, both main, I think the same thing. I'm not a car. Yeah. Yeah, it just means one single body shower. Yeah, you just have this one single thing, which the coachwork is part of the load-bearing frame, right? It comes on a production line. Way faster than mine. Exactly. We don't make money

on frame things anymore besides super heavy-duty trucks. Yeah, and so coachbuilding is much more difficult with these sorts of vehicles. Era custom coachwork sort of by and large comes to a close because again the coachwork itself is part of the frame that makes it lighter that makes it, you know, stronger so on and so forth. Yeah, it's just like real like structural stuff to make one of these. You can't just like bang one out with like a you know a bunch of panels in a hammer. Yeah, so this means custom coachwork largely goes away apart from one specific thing,

which is the stretch limousine, right? So real sort of niche application. Yeah. So, you know, what's the process of making one of these things? You take a car and you add more into the middle. Yeah, it's a thing you can do. You make more car, right? It's a cut and shut. It's a thing you can do illegally with a car that you want to keep a regular length, like, for instance, if you want to like, I don't know, do some car butchery to hide the fact that a car has been like a terrifying accident,

that's just snapped the chassis in half. You cut the front bit off, you weld it to the back bit, was the same again, you cut the front bit off, you weld a middle bit in the middle, and then you weld the back to it, like a fringles tube, kind of. Exactly, exactly. So, the main purpose of this is, you know, you fit more people in the limousine, originally stretch limos are partially used. You're doing irreversible damage to your car in order to make it look more like how you think it should feel.

I mean, it's really like a societal problem. I think you have to stop doing this on cars under like a 25-year-old sort of like a 20. Oh. That said, get rid of the 25-year-old. God damn. So these are mostly used by big bands originally, like in the 20s and 30s. Eventually they become the sort of status symbol luxury items on and so forth, right?

As long to the growth of American popular music and all because you needed something like this to fit like a, I don't know, saxophone in. Yeah, exactly. Like 35 saxophonists. Yeah, 35 saxophones. Yeah, exactly. So now what's the process of doing this? Right. And are there regulations about safety or the integrity of the vehicle? Oh, how's it? Are they improving the braking systems? No, they like making the engine. They are. Why are you doing this? You know, the tires more heavy-duty to for the increased weight. The short answer to all of this is no on this one. The hood doesn't even close.

Yes. Fuck you. Why do you get to? You people are ridiculous. So let's look at the construction of stretch limousine, right? Now step one, get a used luxury car, right? Some coach builders will buy new cars but a lot of time since you need to do a bunch of refurbishment anyway you may as well get a used one right. Yeah you get something like Lincoln that like Matthew McConaughey has been driving around that has

like 18 trillion miles. Oh yeah exactly. It was a delivery car. Don't worry about it. Yeah. Now step two, like Solomon, you cut the car in half, right? Is that what really what we're going with? Yeah. Yeah, that time the King Solomon had a car cut in half. Exactly. And two women who both claimed it was their Miata were like, no! So you do this all over again. All of a woman is like, no, with that story. Yeah, I've already forgot the point of that story. I was reaching for the funniest car name, and I decided it was funniest to cut a meata in half. Yeah. The answer is always cut a meata at hand.

Yeah, so you know, you do this sort of around the B pillar, right, but this depends on the type of car. Step three is you add these light gauge steel rails to the bottom of the top. So they fit roughly with the cuts in the frame, right? And you got to extend the drive shaft if it's a rear wheel drive car, which it usually is. Now step four, you add the floor, you weld the interior steel framing for the seats, the bar in there, you know, all the kutra morn in there.

Yeah, so we've got that. They add a little vertical post in here usually. That's nice of them. Yeah, it really is just like panel basing at this point. Yeah. Yes. Yeah, you're just hitting this thing with hammers, which is fine. You know, step five is you install the interior fittings

that can't be installed later since they won't fit. So that's like the seats, that's like the actual the bar top, you know, so on and so forth. The partition between the driver and the thing, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I want to point out that we're only doing this episode

because Ross is terrified of limousine. And in the limousine, I was in last weekend for my bachelor party. I will say it did have seatbelts in the back, bras. I even looked for you. Oh, yeah. Well, not on every seat, though, right? No, not on every seat. You would have been way in the back. Yeah. Well, some seatbelts is the equivalent of no seatbelts in a lot of accidents. I honestly hope someday we get the car crash and I go flinging into you. So step six, you add the side panels including something called the crash bar, which takes the impact and the event the vehicle gets t-bone. Now we'll talk a bit about that later.

Much later. And then step seven, you fit out the rest of the interior that you can bring in, you know, while the car is intact, then you're, you know, reattaching the brake lines, the electrical lines, so on and so forth. Step eight is optional, where you improve safety systems beyond that of a consumer automobile, right? You have stronger brakes, commercial grade, you know, tires and other systems systems, stuff like that, you know. Some people do that, and other people don't. And at the end of that, you have a car that is like much more difficult to drive, but which can contain a lot more passengers. Oh, Jesus.

but which can contain a lot more passengers. Oh, Jesus. Is that a fiat Uno? Yeah, I think so. Yep. How many, how many uno's this is like that factoid about how many chickens are in a nugget? There's like fucking 50 feet. Who knows? This is from the top gear limousine challenge.

Uh huh. Yeah, which had actual coach building by actual coach builders. It seems to have gone poorly. Yes. It's gone poorly. Yes. So, what are the problems with these kinds of upfits? Is they add a lot of weight to the car without fundamentally changing anything about the

frame. And in fact, they weaken the frame somewhat, right? So, handling's worse, wear in terror, parts to grade faster, there's more wear in terror, generally overstresses the original unibody part of the car. That's a bunch of other fun driving challenges, like the ability to just just ground this thing on a hill. Yes. Yeah. Like, like the presidential limousine, although that that's that's different from a regular limousine. Yeah, that's yeah

So closer to like an aircraft or a submarine or something, you know exactly. Well, it's built on a pickup truck frame I want to see yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah So you had a long car. It's underpowered it handles badly There's some manufacturers whose cars are popular for modification in the stretch limos, you know, your Ford's, Lincoln's, Cadillac, stuff like that. They provide actual guidelines for stretch limo conversions, but coach builders are free to follow those guidelines or to not follow those guidelines, right? A free or die? Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Live free and possibly also die. Live free and possibly also die.

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They've passed all these batteries of tests and inspections, so on and so forth. Yeah, very kind of one. It's kind of one of the crown Victoria, you kind of one. It's a commentary, you know, you talk to a great about hop, I want to look like a cop because I like it. Because I like it. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I think it'd be fun to have like an old checker marathon, you know, the taxi cap. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Made a they made a stretch limo version of that actually, but that was from the manufacturer.

they made a stretch limo version of that actually, but that was from the manufacturer. So, you know, these are predictable and standardized vehicles. You know, there's no secondary manufacturer cutting up a Chevy and ordered it turned it into a Ford, right? Oh, I do a guy who did that, right? We've heard the guy about the Vans engine from had a Duramax swap, F 350, I think. Yeah, yeah, yeah, incredible. So

stretch limos are also subject to hard use day in and day out because that's what's necessary for a profitable limousine company, but they aren't inherently designed for it. Each one of them's custom made, each one has its own quirks, so you need to experience mechanics to work on them. They're also very high maintenance since once again all these parts are being used to do things they're not designed to do. You think this would be a niche for a company to come in and just like purpose build one you know. What if you just cut the car in half and welded stuff to it? Yeah, okay. Now, your consumer grade vehicles, they're tested to destruction and real life crash tests to determine survivability of various impacts and highway speeds, so on and so forth.

These are conducted with reasonable normal car weights, right? They're not conducted with the added weight or bulk of a stretch limousine section. So, you know, once you add momentum from the extra bulk, previous data from the crash test is irrelevant. Every impact is harder, every bit of shielding and every couple zone is less effective, right? So surely then knowing all this,

these vehicles must be strictly regulated, right? I have a vision of my head attached to a body with no seatbelt on it bouncing off the bar surface on the inside of a limo. Yes. Oh, yeah. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. I like limos.

I think they're fun. And the answer to this is, yes, they will be strictly regulated around 2025 at the earliest. Nice show for Andes America. Yeah. So the long and short of the current situation is regulating the stretch limo industry has been devolved to the several states. Some are very strict, some are not. So some states like New York today actually require limousines to have seat belts.

The most basic safety intervention possible. Amazing. And all thanks to the sort of monstrous or well-einterity of the New York State Taxi and Limousine Commission. Yeah. And then there's different state laws about limousines. So a lot of times Since these vehicles are traded around a lot A vehicle come in that subject the regulation from a different state and so ultimately I just hasn't like the way Arizona is the whole of all you house because they basically don't have to expect

Yeah, yeah, like that. You also have a flag of convenience. Yeah, there's a, what the fuck? That's amazing. Okay. Yeah. So, and there's a lot of lax enforcement, right? Then you got to talk about the distinction between a car and a bus, right? Federalist biped.

Yeah. Some states, including New York, require more stringent inspections for vehicles which are classified as a bus, right, which is typically something larger than a 15 passenger van, or at least when the story begins, that was the case. I bought. Yeah. So, let me see, and get around these regulations by being smaller than that. Because if you're a bus, you're subject to strict inspections by the Department of Transportation.

But if you're a car, you just need to go get normal inspections from the DMV, which is, of course, run by private companies. You know, you go down to the pet boys or something. So these limousine aftermarket modifications are poorly reported, poorly tracked. Self reporting is a vital part of the inspection system. So often vehicles which are classified as a car have much more seating than allowed by law. Okay. Okay. Yeah. So in short, the stretch limousine is an underpowered used car with a compromised frame and compromise safety systems, which is difficult to maintain, de facto unregulated,

and which racks up the miles far faster than a consumer automobile with consumer grade parts is expected to. Right? Yeah, but it makes you look cool. And it's got that like flying V and 10 on the trunk, you know? What do you want to look cool? Yeah, don't even want to look important. Well, interestingly, like, there is a, it strikes me a serious client in the use of limousines by people who want to look important, because now, like, even the VIP like competitors

with Uber are just like, yeah, we'll get you like a regular Mercedes. Like a really nice sedan, but. This incident is part of why that happened. Jesus, okay. Yeah. So, all right. Now, back when, back in the day, when every car was a death trap,

none of this really mattered, right? No. You know, back in the day, if you had something an accident that was slightly worse than a fender bender, you just get impaled by the steering column and die instantly. Okay, whatever. Yeah, you're not really feeling it because you have a blood alcohol content of one. Yes. Yeah.

And that's legal. Yeah, that's right. I actually drive better when I have a bit. Yeah. And because it's like, you know, steel body, the car is fine. It just like rolls to a stop with one big dent in it and you're completely dead on the drivers. Yeah, you're completely liquidized. Yeah. You're a single shot of glass left in the fucking windows of the windshield. But the body is fine and you are shredded. Man, they don't build cars like they used to. So we had features like seat belts, airbags, crumples on stronger and heavier frames.

You know, automobile accidents become much more survivable, at least if you're not a pedestrian who are regularly and in fact increasingly mulched by modern vehicles. You know, these new SUVs that lock on to the nearest child and run them over. Yeah, the very aggressive sort of 2020 styling grill, just like crushing. Angry grill. Angry grill, leavens, killing 12 kids. Yes. The slow but undeniable descent into fascism has chastened through the grill of the GMC,

whatever. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. But again, this is all taking the account largely modern regulated tested certified consumer automobiles, which is not a stretch limo. So if you look at, yeah, oh, I got this is gone. I'm going to tell you that. Oh, it's my favorite.

The integrates the survivability onion. Yes, so I'm going outside. Yeah. So if you look at the integrated survivability onion as applied to limousine, you start with don't be seeing if you remove all the don'ts. Don't be acquired. Don't be hit. Don't be penetrated. Don't be killed. Don't be hit. Don't be penetrated. Don't be killed.

Don't be killed is, you know, the little one in here, but as applies to a limousine, that actually extends out to here. If you are hit, you are killed. Okay. You are hit. You are against a weak kill. You are, you are a mulch.

Yeah. Yeah. So, let's talk about prestige limousine and show first service, right? Oh boy. It's best as I can tell based on Google Street View and looking up some old business records. It was based in the backyard of a motel in Gantzafort, New York. Look at those beautiful champagne colored limos out from perfect for the prom. Yes, perfect for the prom. Now,

don't worry about this thing. No, but this is what we started in porcing it because of your like cult, your civ six cultural victory. But like I genuinely just occurred to me at this moment that you guys routinely put your teenagers in these things as a sort of rice of passage. I mean, I went to prom in a yellow VW beetle. Yeah, nice. I was, I forget what vehicle I went to prom and it was massive.

Cody Bex, the yellow VW beetle, she drove. It was real weird. Yeah, that was cool. Yeah, actually, my day drove me to prom too. Yeah. Yeah, I actually my day drove me to prom too. I had prom in the line in modern mass controversy. We had prom in the Pentagon Sheridan. We had prom at the Valencia ballroom in York, Pennsylvania. And then we got kicked out because they had to set up for

a fight night at the Valencia. So this company was run by Shahead Hussein, right? He was a Pakistani immigrant with a colorful past. Yes, he was arrested in 2002 on charges of helping procure illegal drivers licenses in Albany, right? And then he went on to become an FBI informant in the 2009 Bronx bombing terror plot to avoid being deported. All right, okay. But I mean, that's one way of going about it, right? Like you make your compromise with Empire

and you get to like stay in the country. I gotta tell you, if I'm running this out of the back of a motel, as it appears, I'm not putting my three limousines in impoundable view. Like, wow, this has seemed to be a bit foolish to you. Look how much parking they're taking up. This is in September 2016, is when this was from, which is before. They were getting citations by this point, but, but not we'll get into that bit later. Yeah, yeah. So in the meantime, he managed to diverse portfolio of businesses in the United States, including prestige limousine, which went by about four different names over the course of that.

So they operated these three Lincoln town cars, the champagne colored ones and one Ford excursion parked in the back here. I'm guessing that if you run this out of a motel room, you're not converting these yourself. You're buying these birdhouse. Yes. Yes. These are super-man vehicles, yes. So, okay, prestige limousine operated on a number of names, they change it like every 12 months or something in this. A great sign of like quality service. Yeah, and this is not uncommon for limousine or library car services. It's easy to set up the business. The skills are very fungible. You can run these sorts of five by night operations very easily.

I was about to ask what the sort of association between like Lemo, Garages, and like organized crime is. And I think we've just sort of recounted it, you know? I would describe this as disorganized crime. Two. Two. So by all accounts, the fleet was in bad shape. Customers reported holes in the floor of the vehicle,

sort of general shabbiness, very aggressive drivers, but no car in the fleet was so bad as the 2001 Ford excursion. Which is already 17, 18 years old by this point. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Cool. Oh, all right. Oh, Jesus. Okay. Yeah. My dad had a had a had a Bel air. You could see the Florida. See through the Florida. That's good for ice fishing. He bought it for $12. He wasn't taking anyone to trial that I know of. So the 2001 Ford excursion was purchased new from the dealer modified by adding 144 inches

between the B and C pillar by a company called 21st century coach works of Springfield, Missouri. Uh-huh. And they sold it to Royale limousine of Albany. This was French for big Mac limousine. Yes, it's French for, uh, no, that's that's a quarter pounder with cheese. Yeah, I think I'm going to be lying. No, it's just that's just lit Big Mac. So this was sold July 2016 second hand to prestige limousine.

Second, doing a lot of work here. Yeah, it's about to say. Got a little bit of miles on there. As this vehicle's modified, the vehicle had 22 seats pointing bus. Bus. Yeah, that's a bus. A signed bus app coach build. Yes, exactly. It had bus affirmation search room. So, you know, now Ford provided guidance and certification programs are converting its cars to stretch limousines at this time. The Ford excursion was one of them. 21st century coach works did not participate in these guidelines or that program, right? Yeah, didn't read the manual. Fine. Yeah.

It was however required to self-certify that all the vehicles all to refack complied with applicable federal safety standards. It was also required to perform engineering analysis to ensure that the safety systems, like, for instance, the brakes the brakes were still within acceptable performance limits Despite the increased way to the vehicle and what it did was not do those things Surprise here. Yeah Here's here's the vehicle as modified. Oh, it looks like shit. Two side facing batches. Just dying in this thing. Got a backwards facing

batch. You got a bar. You got some seats in the back. You know, and we've gone from having an A B and C pillar to having an A B C D E F G and H pillar. That's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have.

It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have. It's all you have of 15 seats was recommended with upgrades to the chassis, boosters for the brakes, improving the suspension, improving the tires, adding emergency exits, and a maximum stretch of 140 inches, which is 15 inches shorter than how long this was stretched. 4 inches shorter, you said 104 inches. 4 inches, excuse me.

But it was stretched 4 inches longer and had none of those upgrades. Because this is a voluntary, a voluntary set of guidelines. By the end of the day, the vehicle weighed 4965 pounds heavier than it was supposed to. Well, five pounds of other van. I love to get in the prom M rap, you know, yes. So this vehicle is used day in and day out for 18 years is becoming increasingly busted and broken. You know, it's, it's being used in upstate New York. There's lots of snow. There's lots of road salt, you know, the whole thing is going to shit. When in 2016, this very used vehicle came into prestige, limousine ownership, it was clearly in no condition to pass the bus inspection.

So Shahed Hussain did the obvious thing, falsify the capacity of the vehicle and register it in the much more permissive category of passenger vehicle. I was, I was half expecting him to have to to take some seat sound, but not even that, you just lie. No, it's lie. So despite 15 years of evidence to the contrary, the registration was accepted by the Department of Motor Vehicles of New York State. Oh, outstanding work boys. With the listed capacity of eight passengers, which is a standard passenger vehicle requiring nothing but the most cursory annual inspection, the same one you

get for your car, you know. So this is of course not administered directly by the DMV, but by private contractors, you know, the gas station, the tire store, body shop, whatever. Someone who has a sort of urgent need in their palm for some dollars. Yeah, exactly. You know, a friend of a friend, you know, can take a look at it and say, yeah, um, and so this is prestige is first limousine and sets up a long string of violations and notices with no enforcement action. Nice.

Yeah. So I love this story. Here is an instructive story. How to avoid regulations by simply ignoring them? Yeah, I have a theory about this. You know how we're in the decline of the decline in full, but where fewer and fewer public services are getting done. I feel like you can just kind of get away

with most crimes now, but especially like ostensibly minor crimes, even the minor crimes that like lead up to, you know, some real grim shit, just because like no one has the enforcement capacity and the people who do are like, you know, too busy fighting fires, let's rule as a far out all, so you just be like, yeah, whatever. Yeah, I don't know. Shoplifting is legal now, you know, you just do whatever. Yeah, well I did that to themselves with a self-check out. And to themselves here with self-reporting and self-sustaining.

Hi, it's Justin. So this is a commercial for the podcast that you're already listening to. People are annoyed by these, so let me get to the point. We have this thing called Patreon, right? The deal is you give us two bucks a month, and we give you an extra episode once a month. Sometimes it's a little inconsistent, but you know, it's two bucks to get what you pay for. It also gets you our full back catalog of bonus episodes so you can learn about exciting topics like guns, pickup trucks, or pickup trucks with guns on them. The money we raise through Patreon goes to making sure that the only ad you hear

on this podcast is this one. Anyway that's something to consider if you have two bucks to spare each month. Join at patreon.com forward slash WTYP pod. Do it if you want. Or don't, it's your decision and we respect that. Back to the show. So prestige limousine gets us start for the 2016 prom season, right? They apply for an emergency temporary authority to use its brand new used 21 seed Ford excursion on May 18th, 2016.

They were denied. Okay. They applied again and they were denied. They applied again, they were denied. They did this three times all a whole while they were just using the limousine, they didn't give a shit. Right. It's like what were we applied for?

Yeah, they simply continued to operate transporting teenagers for the 2016 prompt season. I believe during this time There was at least one incident where the parents refused to let the kids go in the limousine because it was visibly smoking when it showed up So yeah The worst limous office in the world you guys ever see Duke's ass or? It's like Mexico. So, well, consider the other parents who let their kids go in the smoking limousine. I mean, listen, sometimes people sometimes

just don't love your kids that much. And that's fine. Yeah. It's like fucking let him die, you know? Fuck them. A year later in June 2017, a New York State Department of Transportation, Intermodal Transportation Specialist spotted the vehicle at a Mavis discount tire in Saratoga Springs. He noted that this vehicle would qualify as a bus and checks the Department of Motor

Vehicle Database where it's listed as a passenger vehicle. Oh, boy. Yeah. So he emails the company explaining that no, your vehicle is actually technically a bus. It was illegal to operate. You will never be a passenger. Yeah. And and how to get authority to operate it, right?

He's trying to be helpful here. Avoid anyone getting fine, right? So they ignore the email. Yeah. July 24th on July 24th of that same year, 2017, prestige receives an email from an undercover department of transportation agent, which is new dream job. First, not who you want to get an email from. Yeah. Prestige quotes the DOT guy with $175 plus tip, the trip he requested. And so the DOT gives them a notice of violation and finds them $5,000 for failure to get permission to operate. From this guy who's job is to get like undercover dangerous

limit. I mean, it's actually dangerous, right? Yes. It's a little bit dangerous. Yeah. We found the dangerous law enforcement. It's writing around in the back of a limo. So they find them $5,000 representatives for the company were due to appearing court that October and they just don't do that. I have anxiety. Yeah. Small bean. Um, on January 5th, 2018, another New York State Department of Transportation Specialist was looking for unlicensed operators on Facebook. They found an image of the 2001 Ford excursion with the same license plate. Ask for a quote to transport 13 passengers for five hours.

They got the quote back and then notice a violation to was sent out. You know, so they got it. Easy. Easy. Easy. Yeah, really easy. They got got it easy, easy, easy. Yeah, really easy. And the inspector attempts to set up a date for the New York State Department of Transportation, standard bus inspection. That inspection was confirmed for January 12th, but oops. The day came, the limo was actually back in Saratoga Springs at the Mavis discount tire. It's pirate anchorage, magnificent.

Now, in March, the first $5,000 fine was settled for $500. Right. The DOT finally gets a look at the limo and it's a piece of shit, right? It's got 14 violations, four of which required the vehicle to be immediately removed from service. So the DOT inspector applies an out of service sticker to the windshield of the car, which cannot be removed without DOT authority. Inspectors continue to send polite emails explaining

how to fix the problems and come into compliance. The trance I had. Yeah, premier Leno is bastard people, I think. You know, August, an inspector spots the limousine in service with new license plates. Well, you just had a guy come out with like a vice scraper and take a look. Yeah, you just scrape the sticker off. Yeah. So they send out notice of violation three with a fine of $2,000 and another full bus inspection was scheduled prestige was still operating the vehicle this whole time. Just just have like two cops come out and put a boot on it like right. Yeah. Right. Right. So, on September 4th, the inspection was performed on the excursion in two of the Lincoln town cars, finding three out of service violations and also noting that none of the repairs,

none of the repairs that they had previously reported to be completed had actually been done, because self-certification is extremely reliable. So the out of service stickers go back on. Listen, Gans of all New York PD cannot have that much to do. I just have to say, you know, this could be like, uh, like analysis restaurant type situation where they get all the police cars, you know, so by September 6th, the D.O.T. was starting to get serious, right? They suspended the vehicle registration still very politely with the package of information about how to get back in compliance.

This goes through September 17th. Prestige pays a $500 fine for notice of violation 2. The registration is reinstated, right? Prestige continues to operate the whole time. Another hearing was scheduled for October 5th of 2018. And prestige limousine again does not show up. She says if they just kept the registration suspended, like how much could you have done?

But like, I think at some point, maybe you have to impound the vehicle. Yeah, yeah, at some point, maybe you have to impound the vehicle. Yeah, at some point you get your privilege to take it away. You know, it's, it's, yeah, so this is, this, this, this company is just like, I have government does not apply to me. It's like to grime me to be like active right, like methodically libertarian. It's just like a practically libertarian. right like methodically libertarian. It's just like a practically libertarian. Yeah.

So, Axel Steenberg and his wife Amy of Amsterdam, New York, had planned an outing, had planned an outing with family and close friends at Brey Omega, which is South of Cooperstown, New York. Yeah. I can't get out of the way. Yes. Omega, I'm good though. I once had the, yeah, okay, yeah, we're moving on. Remember, Omega, I was 9% ABV, and I didn't think it was, it was 9% 4% remember that?

Oh yeah. Yeah, that's always a fun time. That was it. The young friends of the preservation alliance open bar, right? Yeah, I think so. Yeah, yeah, I drank a lot of those. It's going to see you two at an open bar. It sounds like an experience. I would like to know. Yeah, open, open bar in a historic building. I went again, Alice. Yeah. Open, open bar in a historic building. Mm-hmm.

So, all right. They, they, they, they plan to charter a party bus for Amy's 30th birthday on October 6, 2018. One day after prestige, you know, it failed to show up in court, right? Mm-hmm. Um, so they plan a charter a party bus, which is generally a safer vehicle than a stretch limousine. It was a bus.

It was a cisgender bus. It's a bus assigned bus at bus, like it's. It's always been a bus and it's designed to bus. Most of them were assigned pickup truck at birth, actually. Oh god, down it, okay. Yeah. pick up truck at birth actually. Oh god damn it okay. Yeah. Signed F 350s with single car around like it like all cars are trans. I'm learning this. Yeah. And Arizona, which is a you know,

unfortunate combination. But the last minute the party bus company canceled. So they booked a limousine instead. For $1475. $1400 to fucking die in a floralist limo. Yeah, that's paying off both of their like violation notices too. Yeah. So, yeah, one problem, which is prestigious limos were all booked except that old Ford excursion. So, someone got a paint scraper and the vehicle was back in service. So, this vehicle was at this time infamous among prestigious drivers, right? It had problems with the brakes and had problems with engine. And it's devised a like stronger sticker or put some like fucking like like nitroglycerin and the adhesive or something like you can.

Maybe impound the vehicle or that. Yeah, you could also do that. So some of the drivers would not touch this vehicle. But um, this is difficult last name. Scott, listen, yeah, listen, each. Listen, each. Yeah. Listen, each. Yeah. Let's go. No passenger doors to those like him driving bus. Yeah. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,burgs and their 16 closest friends got in. Well, these four motherfuckers. Yeah, I don't know how you have 16 friends.

So now, something seemed off about the limo from the moment they set off. One of the occupants outright texted a friend that said, yeah, this thing's a real junker. I hope we make it, you know. Oh Jesus, fuck. Yeah, catch me never sending a portentous text like, oh, I hope we make it. I hope we make it. Yeah, you know, I'm sending 16 texts that are like, I'm gonna fucking die here. We're all gonna fucking die. Yeah. Me when I get on like a perfectly serviceable airplane, or like, you know, any mode of transport.

Yeah, exactly. And the back of an Uber that's like, you know, fine, and I'm just like a goodbye forever to my entire contact list. I will say there's a good deal of problems that here that also apply to Uber's, you know, just because they're not, they're even less regulated.

It's a fleet vehicle that's not regulated as a fleet vehicle. Yeah. And it's not a fleet vehicle. So for reasons that were unclear, the limousine left the New York State through way, which is the most direct route to the brewery and proceeded on backroads for several miles. Right. And there's a couple of theories as to maybe they were going to make a stop somewhere. Maybe they were turning around. Did the driver was the puppet from saw? I personally think it was, you know, the GPS told them to do something stupid. You wait. You see a thing to like have them roll down the partition in a lemon. It's the guy from saw there, the puppet guy. Yeah, that

would be not a great situation because I don't think he can drive. Now, I have to shoot to reach the wheel. Exactly. To reach the pedals. Yeah, exactly. And he's in control of the divider. Yeah, well, I don't know how you have like sort of a saw situation with the divider. I think in that situation, there's a limited amount of things that the clown can do. Getting like bisected by the limo divider. I don't think he has control over the divider either. You have it. So you know, you see the end. You can put it up, I think. We need what I who has sort of like command authority over

the driver put up partisan. Can't drive a Tesla. No, no, that's not. Google just doesn't work anymore. It doesn't work anymore. Yeah. It's right and full. You know, so the vehicle turned on to New York State Route 30, which after a drop of several hundred feet, dead ends into a junction with Route 30A. I mean, like a average descent and, like, a hill, but I just imagine, like, vertical, like, there's a 30-foot cliff in the middle of the road. Yeah, you basically just drop off a cliff. You know, there's several signs warning no trucks no trucks and The steep grade lasts over one mile. It's not orange no trucks. Yeah orange reflectors on it and everything right

So the driver took root 30 several eyewitnesses reported that the limo was at least for a brief period of time They pulled over with the flashers on right? Maybe they're gonna try and make a U-turn or something. Okay, that's less good. All right. Then it started to roll. And it kept rolling and rolling and rolling. During this time, someone in the limousine actually texted someone to say, we're rolling the brakes are gone. What's going on?

Oh my gosh. So they're going down this one mile grade into the Apple barrel store and cafe. Of all the times for the breaks, if I mean, I guess they're like doing the most work. Well, the breaks really weren't working very much at all through the whole trip. Cool. Yeah. So I witnesses at the bottom of the hill

reported the vehicle seemed to be traveling over 100 miles an hour by the time it reached the intersection. The engine sounded like a jet. Okay, so we've just, we've created this sort of land-based cruise missile. Yes. At the very last second, the driver managed to swerve around a car that was in the turn lane, then proceeded at high speed into the Apple Barrel store in Cafe Parking Lot.

He ran over two pedestrians, crashed into a Toyota Highlander, then tumbled into a gully. And by the end of this ordeal, 20 people were dead, including everyone in the limo and the two pedestrians, which was the worst single transportation accident in the United States in 2018. Yeah, I mean, that'll do it, you know. I'll do it. You know, there's a bunch of ugly photos of this, but this is from NTSB showing what happened here.

So a large amount of this vehicle was survivable, right? You know, the driver is getting mulched, regardless of what happens. Everything back here was still intact, right? We're in 50s commode again. Yeah, exactly. So the big problem here though was no one had seat belts, right?

The benches had seat belts on them, you just couldn't actually use them. They were like underneath. Right. I've been in an Uber like this. I've been in an Uber whose seat belt mounting was like backwards. And I was like holding it in with my hand the whole way. And I'm just like, oh, gonna die. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And on the front facing seats, other than the ones that are original to the vehicle, they were improperly mounted, right? So as a chance, if everyone was wearing, if someone was wearing that seatbelt, it wouldn't

have worked. So are you getting like thrown clear of this, or are you just like pinballing around the inside, getting mulched? Everyone slides directly to the front and is in-paled on the shrapnel. front and is in pale down the shrapnel. Oh. Oh. That's real. It's real bad. Catch me grabbing a bottle from the bar on the way down. Yes, that's like slide time.

I go out sober. Yeah, I am having the death of a sort of like Macedonian phalanx, right? I'm grabbing the fuck. Even if it's Bombay Sapphire. I don't give a fuck. I'm like grabbing for something. Yeah. So, so yeah, you're, you know, everyone sort of piles in to a big heap of blood and guts and gore. And then like, you know, I believe two people... I often feel bad for the first responders when we do these things, but I feel bad for the first responders when we do these things. But I feel bad for the first responders when we do this.

Like, two people were pulled from the wreckage, possibly alive. One was pronounced dead at the hospital. The other one was pronounced dead on the way to the hospital. Yeah, and everyone else is at a kind of like shish kebab sort of a rush. Yeah, you've turned into a sort of, yeah, I mean, the stomach-a-bop, yeah, big donner kebab. You of, yeah, I mean, the don't look about. Yeah, big don are about.

You know, yeah, yeah, the pineapple on top and slowly spinning. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's like 15 people too. So it's like you're like fucking, you're like a rat king in there, you know, like a good amount of, if you were having like, like if you didn't like someone in there, you were getting like very intimate with them in your dying moments, you know, yeah, so this was This was friends and family so it essentially

Killed a whole generation Of the family. I mean, it's like you go back in time to like the 19th century and these guys ancestors are like you know There's a fortune tell all the crystal ball Like I don't know what the fuck this thing is, but it's gonna like take you out, you know? Yes. Yeah, this is another thing about the machine crutches like this is they do tend to be decapitation strikes Yeah, yeah, so a bunch of heads sailing over the divider Yeah, yes, heads will roll players out of the living stereo. Yes. I meant that in like the metaphorical way where you know, you take out

not a winner or one. I wouldn't have got that with an actual government limo, you know. Oh yeah, because those are built a lot better than a consumer grade one. Again, the beast would not have this problem. No. The beast doesn't have shop edges on the inside, you know. Yeah, that sounds about right. You'd probably run that straight into a truck and it would win. Right. Yeah. So, okay, so there's this horrible crash. Obviously, there's an investigation, right? And the investigation and the crash was fairly complex, involved a lot of jurisdictional conflicts and most trying to cover their asses, right?

The main culprit here obviously, prestige limousine, they failed to maintain their vehicle, continued to operate it after it was deemed unsafe by the state, even with obvious problems that even the drivers complained about, right? Company knew the brakes didn't work, driver knew the brakes didn't work, the state knew the brakes didn't work, and yet they let the thing on the roads anyway. You know, you're a classic greed, you know?

Right. Yeah. New York State Police take up the investigation, they won't let the NTSB look at the vehicle while they try and build a case. It's too hot wearing motherfuckers. Yeah, exactly. And they immediately find the real source of the problem, which is the driver head. Yeah, I would have passed the NYPD exam. Yeah. Yeah. Scott, the driver had marijuana in his system, which caused the brakes to malfunction case closed. I don't think that that's how that breaks great, great job. Yeah. Well, I'll just go fuck myself. I guess. Yeah. So they would not let the national

transportation safety board have access to the vehicle for quite some time up until December, right? This is like a more conspiratorial woman. Would view this as evidence of like a stately cover up. Like, yeah, they're keeping this shit in a hanger. You know, they got the men in black in there. They did eventually move it into a tent on the site. So yeah.

So, eventually. To match, actually, in December, the state police also tried to remove parts from it, right? No, legitimately. Was this made out of fucking like alien alloys or something? Yeah, it was 2001 Ford excursion made possible by discoveries of Roswell. Then when the NTSB was finally allowed access to the vehicle, the government shut down. Decline and full, you know, it's real and it's strong and it's my friend. So in January, the government reopened and the NTSB was

finally allowed to have a look at the vehicle. And they soon find enough issues to expand the scope of the investigation significantly. Well, besides all the emails that DO2 sent that were like, you've got to fucking fix your shit. Yes, yes, the site from that. So by and large, the NTSB finds all these obvious issues, defective, un-maintained breaks, host of other incorrect issues.

No emergency exits, a dangling brake line, windshield wipers don't work. There's holes in the floor. There's a hell of a sentence. Yeah, there's a hole in the floor. Lots of stuff that obviously should have kept us off the road. They also found that the driver's shoes had the imprint of the brake pedal on them.

So clearly he was trying his damnedest to stop the thing. Yeah, I mean, if the brakes are out and the hand brake doesn't work, you just gotta like steer it, you know? Yeah. Which is hard if you're going a hundred miles an hour in a stretch limo at a small tea intersection. Yeah. Yeah. You got a pretty small window of time to react to that and steer it off into the grass or something. Yeah. The vehicle was insufficiently upgraded for commercial service, although given that the Ford excursion has a very large towing capacity, it should have

been able to stop in time. Regardless, but the real problem here is the NTS by you find some disturbing patterns, not just in the limousine and question, but the whole stretch limo industry. It wasn't that safety standards were inadequate. They find, of course, that safety standards don't exist. We just uncovered a wholly unregulated industry. Yeah, it's like hiding in plain sight this whole time. So, you know, improperly mounted or nonexistent seat belts with a norm, fraudulent licensure was widespread. There were no crash safety standards. There were no standards on how to modify vehicles. The whole thing was just the wild, wild west. So these safety standards basically had to be developed from whole cloth and they needed money

and legislative authority to do so, which of course they didn't get. Of course, because these are the salad days of like, you can't get anything, however, like a bipartisan done. Because they couldn't, they couldn't even run the NTSB for 35 days. Yeah. Yes, this is the beautiful, beautiful days of Republican, I'm starting to know, Donnie, Donnie for Queens. Yeah. And Donnie for Queens. Yes. So one man takes it upon himself.

Do something. Okay. Seeing here in in the Italian American Hitler car. Yeah. Yeah. I'm double. It's Italian American. I'm so. Yeah. Governor Cuomo pictured here an FDR's limousine. Right. Why did FDR have this is the social democratic hit the limousine?

Yes. Talk about that. Um, Gavin Aquomo, he just tries to ban stretch limos outright in the state of New York. It's not about my idea to be honest. The limo industry didn't like that. Oh, I forget where I read this, um, but I'm pretty sure I did read this and it's true. Uh, the limousine, uhine industry was trying to lobby them. They brought them to a coach builder, right?

You know, to show how safe modern limousines are. And they show them, okay, here's the crash bar that protects the limousine from side impacts. Because there had been a previous limousine incident a couple years prior to this in Long Island where a limousine was making a U-turn and a T-bound, yeah, poorly. And that killed four people outright instantly. Who are all sisters going to a bachelor at party? Yeah, that's another whole generation of a family wiped out. Yeah.

Anyway, they brought Andrew Cuomo to a coach builder to show how safe these new limousines were and Cuomo grabbed one of the crash bars and bent in his hand. That's going poorly. Yeah. In like that. Why is this crash bar as limp is overcooked, ZD? Yeah. Yeah. Once, once Cuomo's habit of just grabbing things comes to a good place for his constituents.

Exactly. Well, Cuomo ultimately drops the stretch limo ban, but did in states, stiffer, stiffer civil penalties for bad limazines gave the department of transportation more power to actually keep them off the roads. And you had to install seat belts and everyone had to wear them. I believe there was some proposal to ban stretch limos over 10 years old. That didn't go anywhere because that was effectively a ban on stretch limos periods. But these regulations only applied in New York, right? National limousine safety regulations had to wait.

In the meantime, the public catches on that all these things are death traps, right? The limousine industry itself starts to sort of slow decline. Automakers really stopped providing guidelines on how to stretch new cars. 60% of stretch limousine operators in New York State were out of business by 2022, although that was helped along by the pandemic, obviously. although that was helped along by the pandemic obviously. And it took a long, long time, but finally, a proposal to study development of limousine safety standards made it into the infrastructure investment and jobs act of 2021. So there will be safety standards for limousines developed by and ready for approval in 2025. Which which will be enforced, I assume vigorously.

Well, in the meantime, there are essentially no new stretch limousines being constructed. The, the stretch of like sock them, Hitler car. Yeah. The industry just straight up imploded. Um, goods, bit regulation killed an industry because if your industry can't survive regulation, it shouldn't. Yeah, this is true. Um, now she had who's saying who owned prestige limousine escaped charges by fleeing

back to pack Pakistan. Um, I'm not out. Now his son, uh, now man, Nauman, I don't know. He ran the company day to day. He did not escape charges. He was sentenced to five to 15 years for 20 counts of criminally negligent homicide. Oh geez.

And then there's a lot of ongoing litigation about this. Still everyone sued, everyone else, everyone from the limousine company to the state department of transportation to the Apple barrel store and cafe. Everyone's very mad at each other and that's still ongoing. And who knows how that'll turn out, but I think you know, we did have a positive outcome, which is fucking over the limousine industry. Yeah, the crash that killed Lemos. Yeah. This is, I genuinely knew none of this and I've learned so much. Yeah, I mean, you know, this is why I'm kind of like

too hard and fast rules about transportation for me. No helicopters and no limousines. Yeah. Another big switch to helicopter. I guess that's the Chinook, which will be a future episode, maybe. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Or that big stupid Soviet one. Forget what I said. Doesn't narrow it down. Yeah. That's a good point. Yeah. Well, what did we learn? Um, I'm getting a limo. Don't do it. Don't do it. Don't get in the limo.

And that's genuinely it. Like if someone offers you a limousine ride, they are trying to kill you. Yes, I am. Yes, I am. I've always wanted to. Like in a thriller movie, you know, when I like the rich guy pulls up and his limo and he's like getting the back of the limo, that's, you know, yeah, that is a death sentence, it's not the way you think. Yeah, exactly. It's it's someone pulls a gun on you and it's like the second most dangerous thing that's happening. Yeah, his plan to shoot me is thwarted when we both fly forward at 40 miles an hour and slam into the jagged wreckage of the driver. Yes.

I have a cunning plan to escape this death threat by impaling myself on the web. He's got a long gun of some kind and then you just wind up and pailed on the gun. This one, this one was bleak, but I really a gladdened my heart to learn that Andrew Cuerva had a hit LeCar for a minute. Yeah, he drove that. He had that restored at state expense. Drive over. So he could drive over the new tap and see bridge in it. I probably shouldn't call every like black open top 19 30s limousine and the helicopter. It looks like the helicopter. Like, what's cool? What's cool?

Say I can this picture. I'm going to take the third right. Oh, yeah. It's just a solid joke from top. All right. We have a segment on this podcast called Safety Third. Hello, Justin, Alice, Yalim, no gods, no masters, and possible guest. This is a story of my thankfully short time spent in prison. Strong opening, let's go.

Let's hear about it. I'd like to include a story from my time at Westphill Correctional Complex. I do sincerely believe you guys should do an episode about that hell on earth. I was only there for a scant few months and most of my stories from there involved stabbings or move and cockroaches in the kitchen. Westfield, Indiana. Yeah, exactly. Indiana prison. Instead, Indiana prison sounds pretty bad. I don't want to be an Indiana to start out

with. They lock you there. They lock you in Indiana. To care about the cults, you know, yeah, exactly. No, in can make me they fucked up with the city of Baltimore. Instead, this is a story about me on the ground screw detail at Miami level one, where I was eventually transferred. Indiana prison, you got to commute from yourself to work back again. So this is Ohio prison actually. Okay. I think I think I just I just might be Florida prison as well. I don't know. Okay, this guy we assume guy this person was in prison like he was in a prison. For those who don't. Oh, so this is Indiana never mind. I should have read the next that they just call it like Miami. You know, I was thinking like Miami River or something.

You know, yeah, no, it's maybe maybe they named it that way to make you feel like cool and exhausted. Yeah. Like, damn, I mean, like Miami. I mean, Miami. You're in like Aspen, you know, or hang out with Cub Hang in there with Cubans, you know? Yeah. Like one of these stuff, something. Yeah. Those who don't know, Indiana has a level one to five system for its incarcerated individuals. All facilities are one to four with five being placed aside for particularly militant detainees.

That's their word and not mine. We were prisoners. Level ones are for people with five or less years to do. Level two is for people with 10 or less if they have certain things with their case, they're their repeat offender or something. The reason for 15 or more and fours or 20 or more specific cases like multiple murders, getting caught with a certain amount of drugs, illegal firearms, so on and so forth, right? At Miami level one, as in all Indiana state prisons, I was assigned a job as I already

had a GED or equivalent, and thus could not qualify for the education opt out. The job was ground screw detail. It's basically consisted of walking up to pick up the trash from inside the fence of Miami level three and four, and then throw it in the trash compactor. However, the main correctional officer who ran out shifts with this absolute shithead named Walker. Wait, a correctional officer being a shithead crazy. I unbelievable. Yeah. He was an old man who drank a lot on the job and used us for bullshit labor that we were not supposed to do all the fucking time. How these trash pickups usually work was two or three of us would get called out

about seven or eight a.m. to put on our special yellow jumpsuits and then walk out of the processing building outside of the dorm, go, we get in this absolute shit box of a Dodge duly pickup and then drive through the main gate into the level three or four, then go to a specific spot to fill up the bed with all the discarded refuse of a few hundred other incarcerated individuals and then take it back to the process of building to be thrown in the big compactor and or grab

the trash and recycling from the main kitchen and compact that. That's nasty too. I've seen the shit like president's throwout of windows like. Yeah, yeah, exactly. You know, you're gonna be however, this one particular day Walker as he did many other days, had extra bullshit for us. On this detail is just me and this absolute dipshit named Perez. I'm loving that we're naming names here, by the way. Yeah. Perez was a grade A dumbass.

Didn't understand Jack's shit about prison politics. And many times almost got his ass beat. You're going to get like killed off of recording this safety third. Yeah. Instead of the episode, we have to record in a couple of weeks time that's actually gonna get us killed. Yeah, exactly. Stay tuned for that. I cannot stress. Dude, didn't understand Jack shit about prison politics. Many times, almost got his ass beat. And I cannot stress enough how out of the ordinary this was. Level ones are for people sentenced to low level felony or people who have leveled down from higher levels and just want to do their time and go home.

You know, this basically do's with two to three years and a lot to lose. But anyway, just an absolute idiot, unable to follow basic instructions or understand social norms. So a podcaster. Anyhow, today due to understaffing among the prison population, this time in the dorm, they're just under 100 of us, at least 30 or 40 of which were in some sort of educational program or another that excluded them from work. The other's one to get different jobs like kitchen, dorm detail, recreation liaison maintenance blah, blah, blah. jobs like kitchen, dorm detail, recreation liaison maintenance blah blah blah.

It was just me and him. After throwing the trash in the compactor, Walker wanted this dispose of this old air conditioning unit and a broken office and cabinet drawer combo. One of those shitty ones made of the particle board and too many screws. In order to do so, we first had to disassemble them and then disassemble them into their constituent parts, then take those and throw them in one of those large dumpsters you see for houses where hoarders lived. One of these guys, yeah. So this took one to two hours as we were not maintenance and that's not clear to use power tools like drills, so all of these screws had to be unscrewed by hand with wrenches. Once into manageable pieces we had to hand load them into the tines of a forklift and

raise it to the height of a dumpster and then kick it off into said dumpster. Already sounding dangerous. Yes. Said dumpster was already full of various scraps of metal and other nasties. I was the one standing on the tines while Perez drove the forklift because he was a a dipshit and be old. If he's a dipshit, why is he drive, okay.

Yeah, I know. Just volunteering to get hurt for this guy. I will say that standing on the tines also makes you a dipshed. All right. So we're just pissing off two guys open in prison now. Okay. Exactly. Yeah.

I guess they ask you to do dangerous things in prison. Yeah. And there's not much you could do to say no. This was not a full body forklift, however. Instead, it was one of those little shitty ones that you walk behind while hitting the throw up. I hate those things. They look so much more dangerous.

Yes. Anyway, we get to the dumpster and Perez raises me in the half of an air conditioning unit about 10 feet so I can kick the shit into the dumpster. Once it hides, I see he's too far off and tell him to ease it in. Instead he guns it on this tiny shit box for the couldn't have gone more than 15 mile an hour on a downhill. The front body slams into the side of the dumpster, nearly throwing me from my perch on the tines into a pile of jagged rusted metal scraps. This is, Affa mentioned Limo disaster on a smaller scale. Yeah.

Um. Perez sees the over corrected and overcorrects again, slamming the thing into reverse, which is about 75% of the speed of forward and almost throws me into the pile of sheet metal and rebar a second time. I proceeded to custom out, at which point Walker tells me to stop complaining and for Perez to be more careful.

So the correction officer is watching them do this the whole time. Yeah, just watch out. It's like a balanced precarious. There's a lot of that. Yeah, it's about to say, doing forklift, circuit, is so lay. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. So, all right. I proceeded to cuss him out, at which point Walker tells me to stop complaining for Perez to be more careful. I managed to kick the AC in the dumpster and get down. I resist the urge to cuss out Walker as it resulted in a write-up, and I really just wanted to go home. We do this about three more times until it disassembled shelf and AC unit are in there, and I get to go back to the dorm and go to sleep. Amazing. You did it. Perez would wind up getting released a month or so later as he's on a very low level

charge and Walker ended up almost getting murdered after getting in the middle. After getting in the middle of some level three and four stealing stuff out of the kitchen, I switched to a dorm detail, which was just changing the trash and wiping down tables. And then I got released a few months afterwards. Congratulations on surviving Indiana prison. Yeah, I was about to say if the gangs don't get you to forklift will love the show. It's been an absolute treat to listen to while gaming or it worked. They're jumping the full cliff into the Mexican mafia and that much love

from Rango slash Ant Man. Cool. For the bunch of tattoos. Yeah. Yeah. It's like you third. Oh, yeah. It's is where the fuck. She was. There we go. Safety third. Wow. We got through that one quick. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Our next episode is Chernobyl. Does anyone have to come, commercials before we go? Can you guys hear me? I feel like I'm a person. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We, we all would like to have stuff going on. You should check that out. Yeah. It's about to say if about to say, if you didn't,

if you didn't come to the live show, fuck you. We're working on releasing it. We're working on releasing it. It's been worked upon. We have about 75 different audio and video tracks and we're trying to piece together which ones are usable.

Stay tuned also for the episode that gets us all killed. The episode that gets us all killed will be coming in like a few weeks time. Yeah. It's part of the reason for the release schedule is the fact that we are going to release an episode that's going to get us all killed. Once we are all killed, please continue to donate to the Patreon to feed our families. Right.

Oh, that reminds me of another aspect of the limousine crash. Yeah. The day after it, they refunded all the money to the dead people. You kind of got to, right? I guess so, but it's, you know, it's, I guess you have to, but it's kind of a, you know, as a guest, you're a charity. It's kind of, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. So, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. So, well, that was a podcast.

Yep. Bye, everyone. Bye, everyone.