What could only be described as a tragedy occurred this morning along interstate 790. Two tractor-trailers collided; causing a chain reaction along the interstate that resulted in several more crashes. Though a preliminary investigation has been done, the Cambridge Police Department has not finished their investigation of the incident, which occurred around 6:45 this morning. Sgt. Albert Wei confirmed a total of four tractor-trailers as well as 14 other vehicles were involved in this terrible accident.
One tractor-trailer contained highly flammable diesel fuel, which Sgt. Wei said was very lucky not to have rolled over and caught fire in the accident. Though the truck’s cab was damaged when a car collided with it, the driver was not hurt, and he managed to bring the trailer to a stop along the side of the road. Two people were killed, and 20 injured, four of them seriously. According to Fire Chief Tony Sullivan, firefighters were forced to cut the roofs off of three of the cars in order to free the people trapped within. Every one of the Fire Department’s five ambulances was needed, along with four other ambulances from neighboring departments. Also on scene, the “Life Flight” helicopter from Memorial Hospital, which flew the two most severely, injured victims to the trauma center in Statesville, 50 miles away.
Sullivan said the scene more closely resembled a war zone then an accident, with bodies littered along the road, other’s sitting covered in blood next to their cars, with emergency workers running from one person to another as they tried to help the injured victims. The wailing of sirens from emergency vehicles added to the effect. Chief Sullivan said in his 18 and half years with the department, he’d never seen anything as bad as this, a chilling testimony to a tragic event. According to Sgt. Wei the police had trouble-matching people to their cars, adding to the confusion.
Wei reported the accident happened in the northbound lanes, causing both north and southbound lanes to close. They remained closed at 10 am, when this story published. Traffic normally on interstate 790 was redirected to interstate 690, on the other side of town. This shuffling of traffic caused interstate 690 to be backed up for over three hours.
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