HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — The key site visitors artery linking New England with New York shall be closed in Connecticut for days after a tanker fireplace broken a bridge over Interstate 95, Gov. Ned Lamont stated Thursday.
The tanker truck full of gasoline burst into flames in a three-vehicle crash Thursday on I-95 in southwest Connecticut, closing the East Coast’s principal north-south freeway and inflicting main site visitors jams. Whereas Lamont stated there have been no critical accidents within the 5:30 a.m. accident in Norwalk, the crash precipitated harm to the bridge above it.
“The warmth from the burning gasoline compromised a number of the bridge, in order that bridge goes to have to return down and that demolition goes to begin very first thing tomorrow morning,” Lamont stated at a briefing Thursday night in Hartford.
He stated the hope is to reopen the interstate by Monday morning.
Whereas the bridge was lower than 10 years previous, “the harm was fairly extreme as a result of quantity of gasoline that was within the tanker ignited straight beneath the bridge construction,” Connecticut Division of Transportation Commissioner Garrett Eucalitto stated. “The metal did start to overheat and warp.”
The tanker had been carrying a load of about 8,500 gallons (about 32,000 liters) when it crashed beneath the Fairfield Avenue bridge, officers stated. The overpass didn’t seem at risk of collapsing, stated Scott Hill, chief engineer for the Connecticut Division of Transportation.
Visitors was backed up for dozens of miles throughout the morning rush hour, and prolonged delays remained within the space into Thursday night and have been anticipated by the weekend. Sluggish-moving detours have been arrange, taking site visitors off the freeway and across the accident scene. The crash left different highways and secondary roads in gridlock. The key alternate route within the space, the Merritt Parkway, can’t be utilized by vehicles as a result of the underpasses on that freeway are too low.
Textual content alerts have been despatched to residents of Connecticut, New York and New Jersey, and trucking corporations who use the part of I-95 have been notified to search out different routes and technique of journey, he stated. U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg additionally was notified.
“I do know what an unbelievable inconvenience that is for individuals and all I can ask you to do is avoid that space as greatest you possibly can,” Lamont stated throughout an earlier briefing in Hartford. “The site visitors jams are horrendous.”
Crews offloaded about 4,000 gallons (about 15,142 liters) of gasoline that was unburnt and remained on the tanker. Utility crews have been additionally working to exchange downed wires.
Environmental crews labored to wash up gasoline and firefighting foam. The Division of Power and Environmental Safety stated the runoff was contained to a retention pond and didn’t make it into the Norwalk River.
The accident was harking back to final 12 months’s lethal accident in Philadelphia alongside I-95 when a tractor-trailer carrying gasoline misplaced management and caught fireplace, destroying a bit of the freeway.
The crash additionally got here simply over a 12 months after the same wreck on I-95 in Connecticut that pressured the closure of the freeway.
In April 2023, one other gasoline truck caught fireplace after colliding with a stopped automobile on the Gold Star Memorial Bridge between New London and Groton. The gasoline truck driver was killed. The crash shut down the southbound facet of the bridge for hours, whereas the northbound facet was closed briefly. The driving force of the automobile was not too long ago charged with negligent murder.
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Related Press author Dave Collins contributed to this report
Susan Haigh And Pat Eaton-robb, The Related Press
