8-hour 5 Freeway closure for man on bridge in San Diego area created hundreds of horror stories

The gridlock was epic.
For eight hours on Friday, Interstate 5 at Del Mar Heights Road in the San Diego area was closed, at times in both directions, as police talked with a suicidal man perched on a bridge above the freeway. And for miles around that spot, motorists endured a massive, extended transportation nightmare that slowed travel around the region.
Social media posts captured some of the pain. For some, nature called and there was no way to answer. Someone wrote on X that they saw a guy