IDOT Just Scared Everyone By Mistakenly Saying There’s a Hole in the I-80 Bridge

Here’s a lesson in PR from the Illinois Department of Transportation: Confirm your information before you Tweet it out.

Around 11:00 this morning, a since-deleted Tweet from IDOT stated that two lanes were closed on the Eastbound side of the Des Plaines River Bridge because of “a hole in the bridge deck.”

Naturally, thoughts of a giant hole through which you can see the flowing river below popped into mind. The saddest part is that it’s 100% believable given the terrible condition of that bridge!

Thankfully for drivers, but unfortunate for IDOT’s social media team, that information was inaccurate according to a Tweet IDOT sent at 11:14. We had to correspond with them just be make sure we have things straight:

Correct.

— IDOT (@IDOT_Illinois) May 17, 2019

Well thank goodness there isn’t a hole in the I-80 bridge. Hopefully one day we’ll live in a world where a Tweet like that is met with thoughts of “oh, that can’t be right, it must be a mistake.” instead of today’s reaction of “Oh…of course there is!”