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Airport truck spinning in circles is the perfect metaphor for 2019

Yes, of course there are memes.

Caitlin Welsh

on October 1, 2019

If you want to understand what's going on in Washington D.C. right now, you could read any one of the impeachment explainers going around, or watch snarky wrap-ups by your favorite late-night hosts.

Or you could just watch this video of a driverless airport catering cart spinning wildly out of control on the tarmac, endangering everyone around it as they stare in horror, unsure of how exactly to handle this unprecedented disaster in the making.

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Dr Kevin Klauer took the video from the departures lounge at O'Hare Airport in Chicago, where he was waiting for a flight (on a different plane to the one pictured) when the commotion out the window caught his eye.

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"A case of water fell off the seat and landed on the accelerator pedal," he told Mashable. "[A]nd the wheel was turned, so it started to slowly accelerate and taking these these wider and wider turns until the point where it wasn't really funny anymore. It was picking up speed and there was no way that the people who were trying to chase it to grab it without harming themselves."

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By the time Klauer's video begins, the cart is already doing wild reverse donuts on the tarmac, with bottles of water, plastic tubs full of soda cans and single-serving spirits going flying and being crushed under the teetering tires.

"One more revolution of that thing and it was going to take out the nose of the aircraft and I'm pretty certain that's where some of the radar equipment is, would have been an expensive mishap. But fortunately, that person came in on the tug, and toppled that thing over and saved the day."

It's a strong narrative with clear heroes, rising action, and an unpredictable antagonist you can't tear your eyes away from. So it's no wonder that as Klauer's video started to pick up retweets at a similar pace, people saw a resemblance to the other clustertruck currently transfixing the nation.

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Dr Klauer, who's the CEO of the American Osteopathic Association, enjoyed the many "modifications" in his mentions, but mostly wanted to ensure the American Airlines employee who took the rogue cart out got some recognition.

And while he wasn't aware of any delays directly caused by the incident, as he pointed out, "it was O'Hare."

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Topics Viral Videos Politics

Caitlin Welsh

Caitlin is Mashable's Australian Editor. She has written for The Guardian, Junkee, and any number of plucky little music and culture publications that were run on the smell of an oily rag and have since been flushed off the Internet like a dead goldfish by their new owners. She also worked at Choice, Australia's consumer advocacy non-profit and magazine, and as such has surprisingly strong opinions about whitegoods. She enjoys big dumb action movies, big clever action movies, cult Canadian comedies set in small towns, Carly Rae Jepsen, The Replacements, smoky mezcal, revenge bedtime procrastination, and being left the hell alone when she's reading.