As American trucks and SUVs have gotten bigger, they now rival the size of the tanks American auto makers once helped build to win World War II.
Pickup trucks are the most popular vehicles in the nation, with SUVs trailing not far behind, and they now in many cases exceed the length of the American M4 Sherman produced at the outset of America's involvement in the war in 1942.
The tank was a mainstay of the Allied forces during the conflict, and American auto giants GM, Ford and Chrysler helped produce 50,000 of the steel beasts, before going back to producing civilian vehicles for the people back home.
But since then, the civilian vehicles have slowly grown in size to become the behemoths of the road they are today.
The Ford F150 pickup truck - the most popular vehicle in the country with 787,422 units sold in 2020, according to Car And Driver - is now longer than a Sherman tank at 250 inches long, compared to the tank's 228 inches.
And it's not the only one.
The Chevrolet Silverado (266 inches long), Dodge Ram (242 inches long) and GMC Sierra (231 inches long) all have the M4 beat.
As American vehicles get ever larger, driven largely by market factors, they are now rivaling the size of the tanks that fought in World War II
Vehicles driven by Americans have become gradually larger over the past three decades, driven by an overwhelming market preference for them. SUVs outsell sedans two-to-one.
The top three most popular vehicles are pickups - The F150, Chevrolet Silverado and Ram 1500 - and make up roughly 13 percent of all vehicles sold in the country, according to Vice, which also did an analysis comparing the size of tanks and American trucks and SUVs.
In most cases America's most popular pickups and SUVs are longer than the vintage tanks, but often shorter in height and narrower.
The Sherman, for example, was 108 inches high, while the cabin for a pickup topped out at 81
