# Crash in Niagara Falls (Wed November 22, 2023) \[Rainbow Bridge car explosion\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Tags:** breaking-news\ **Created:** [November 22, 2023, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546 "2023-11-22T19:23:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/21 "2023-11-22T20:32:21Z")
Well we see something blow up pretty good, but I can’t even tell from this video which way the car was going. Both sides kinda look the same in the border stations. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/22 "2023-11-22T20:36:47Z")
> [@WildaBeast](#): > > There’s more than one, actually – there’s an historic concrete arch bridge with that name in the town where I live as well, so the story presented a different kind of confusion for me. That’s the bridge I thought of as well. Ditto confusion. Since when do suicide bombers travel in pairs? They were Mormon, maybe? 🤔 ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/23 "2023-11-22T20:38:29Z")
If the car made it over the bridge and through primary inspection they should have both the license plate information and the presumptive identities of the occupants, although all could be stolen or fake. I’ve personally crossed one of those 4 bridges multiple times per year and as frequently as twice a week when I worked in Buffalo for 6 months. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/24 "2023-11-22T20:38:51Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Well we see something blow up pretty good, but I can’t even tell from this video which way the car was going. I’m guessing right to left, going fairly quickly and either exploding or hitting the booth and exploding. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/25 "2023-11-22T20:41:10Z")
Well, no, I meant Canada-USA or USA-Canada. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/26 "2023-11-22T20:41:14Z")
Yeah, it doesn’t make sense for there to be two people in the car for a suicide bomb. Even if you can convince two people to blow themselves up, wouldn’t it make more sense to give a separate bomb to each one? Maybe Plan A was to go through customs without incident and then place the bomb… somewhere… on the other side, and then when customs got suspicious, someone decided on the missile approach and detonated it early. Or maybe the bomb was poorly-enough constructed that it was triggered by the crash (professional explosives are generally designed to be really hard to detonate the wrong way, but this might have been something cobbled together). ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/27 "2023-11-22T20:44:30Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Well, no, I meant Canada-USA or USA-Canada. news reports I have seen put it as Canada —\> USA. But these are early reports. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/28 "2023-11-22T20:44:59Z")
CNN: All four bridges between the US and Canada, across the Niagara River, have been shut down. Buffalo International Airport has been closed. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/29 "2023-11-22T20:46:43Z")
One does not generally attain super high speeds there. For those unfamiliar with the area, Rainbow is the bridge that literally connects downtown Niagara Falls, Ontario with Niagara Falls, New York. It’s open to pedestrians, too. There are two other car bridges in the area but they’re not actually in Niagara Falls. A car coming from Canada is in the tourist area rolling past the indoor waterpark, Casino Niagara, and Bird Kingdom. If someone is coming it at very high speed they are really panicking or they meant to do so. A car coming from the US side, if the witness in the youtube video is correct, wouldn’t have much more opportunity to speed up. You can approach on Niagara, Main or Rainbow streets, but none really quite give you a straight path into the checkpoint. That is by design, of course, to avoid accidents where people don’t realize how fast they’re going. ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/30 "2023-11-22T20:53:05Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Yeah, it doesn’t make sense for there to be two people in the car for a suicide bomb. Even if you can convince two people to blow themselves up, wouldn’t it make more sense to give a separate bomb to each one? I could imagine maybe they wanted to make sure the first person wouldn’t chicken out and change their mind at the last minute; having a second person there watching them might make them more likely to follow through with the plan, or if they do change there mind then the other person is there to detonate the bomb. ---
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/31 "2023-11-22T20:55:24Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > perhaps the driver suffered a medical emergency, such as a heart attack Or perhaps [Intermittent Explosive Disorder](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK519704/table/ch3.t18/)? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/32 "2023-11-22T20:55:53Z")
STAY AWAY from the chili!!! ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/33 "2023-11-22T20:56:01Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > One does not generally attain super high speeds there. Yeah, this makes me skeptical of the one witness who says the car was going from US toward Canada, in opposition to the preliminary reports from more official sources. This witness also said the car was moving 100 mph, which just doesn’t seem possible there. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/34 "2023-11-22T20:56:28Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Yeah, it doesn’t make sense for there to be two people in the car for a suicide bomb. Even if you can convince two people to blow themselves up, wouldn’t it make more sense to give a separate bomb to each one? It would make sense if they were trying to throw off the customs agent’s profiling. “Single guy in a car on a major family visit weekend? Suspicious!” ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/35 "2023-11-22T20:59:47Z")
Hmm, that really just seems to be the gasoline in the car igniting when it is vaporized. My guess is that is the only thing causing the explosion and fire. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/36 "2023-11-22T21:03:26Z")
paging our “blowin’ up good” expert: @Tripler ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/37 "2023-11-22T21:03:58Z")
I’d say it’s too soon the say whether it was a bomb or not, given the reports I’m reading online. Some sources say it was coming from Canada; others now are saying it came from the US side; witness accounts are conflicting (not surprising; eyewitness accounts are often unreliable). I’ve read elsewhere that the NY Times is reporting it isn’t clear whether it was a bomb or not. The most recent update from the Times: > The car involved in the incident was speeding from the U.S. side towards Canada, a senior law enforcement official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss an open investigation. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/38 "2023-11-22T21:05:13Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > Buffalo International Airport has been closed. Only to international flights, domestic operations are continuing > **[Buffalo airport closed to international flights after explosion at US-Canada...](https://www.reuters.com/world/us/buffalo-airport-closed-international-flights-after-explosion-us-canada-border-us-2023-11-22/)** > > Buffalo Niagara International Airport was closed to departing and arriving international flights on Wednesday as authorities continued to investigate a vehicle explosion at the Rainbow Bridge connecting the United States and Canada at Niagara Falls,... ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/39 "2023-11-22T21:06:02Z")
I do have to say, I was expecting something more dramatic. Perhaps I’m jaded. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2023, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546/40 "2023-11-22T21:08:32Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > One does not generally attain super high speeds there. I have no idea how they could have gone 0-100 between primary and secondary inspection. The Peace Bridge and QL have a lot more room due to the truck traffic, but RB is tight. The other way from Niagara makes more sense, but still unlikely. Chris Lewis, the former OPP commissioner was just on the radio. He thinks it’s unlikely that it was terrorism as blowing up the car on the middle of the span would have been much more attractive as a target. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crash-in-niagara-falls-wed-november-22-2023-rainbow-bridge-car-explosion/993546.md?page=3)