Driving isn't hard enough?

My title is a little misleading. If there had been more room, I'd have said, "As if driving before the Thanksgiving holiday isn't hard enough..."

I saw a report about a tanker leaking a tar-like material over a forty mile stretch of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. This report at National Public Radio has a bit of video with it. There is a another angle to the story in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette where people are blaming the turnpike authorities for not closing down the highway. Finally, here's another version from television station WPXI in Pittsburgh that has some pictures of the mess.

People were not aware of what was going on until their cars started handling badly. Then they noticed that other people were pulled off on the side of the road. What a mess. From the pictures, I don't know how no one was seriously hurt. It looks like one of those things that happens suddenly and it certainly wasn't something that you would have experience driving in. You'd never know how to handle the situation before it happened.

I often wonder about this. You try to be careful and figure everything out and practice and learn and study and prepare yourself for the troubles you'll face in life. And then somebody pours tar on the road in front of you.