A tank truck carrying flammable liquid plunged over a concrete barrier on a highway overpass in northeastern Howard County yesterday, killing at least four people as it landed in heavy traffic on Interstate 95 and exploded into flames, authorities said.
Officials shut down the highway in both directions after the 3 p.m. crash, in which the tanker fell about three stories from the Interstate 895 overpass in Elkridge.
Flame-retardant foam was spread at the scene after a tanker carrying a flammable liquid landed on Interstate 95 and exploded into flames. Police said that although the truck's speed was not known, it was obviously going fast.
(Ricky Carioti -- The Washington Post)
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• Northbound I-95 traffic should use MD 295 (Exit 22) or MD 32 (Exit 38) to US 29 (Exit 16) to I-70 (Exit 25) to I-695.
• Southbound I-95 traffic should use eastbound I-695 (Exit 64) to MD 295 (Exit 7).
• Southbound I-895 traffic should use US 1 (Exit 1).
Source: Md. Transportation Authority
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The southbound lanes of I-95 reopened about four hours after the accident, and officials said early this morning that they hoped to reopen the northbound lanes in time for this morning's rush hour. "We are very optimistic," a spokesman for the Maryland Highway Administration said at 1:30 a.m.
At least five vehicles were confirmed caught in the fiery wreck, which encompassed all four northbound lanes. Flames burned for more than three hours, igniting a five-acre brush fire along the shoulder and complicating early efforts to determine how many vehicles and victims were involved. The vehicles involved were the tanker, two tractor-trailers, a pickup truck and another passenger vehicle.
Authorities at the scene said only one person -- the driver of a tractor-trailer that struck the tanker -- emerged alive from the tangled mass of blackened debris. As of late last night, none of the victims had been identified.
Drivers who screeched to a stop just short of the 10-foot-high flames said the scene resembled an airplane crash, with melted metal and charred wreckage, and ashes spread across a wide area. A specialized firetruck from nearby Baltimore-Washington International Airport, one of the first to respond, spread piles of flame-retardant foam at the scene.
"This is a horrible, horrendous accident. There are some people who have lost their lives, and their families need our prayers," Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. said at a news conference in the evening. "This is a very difficult day."
Accident investigators working under high-intensity lights searched for clues along the overpass to try to determine why the tanker, which was headed south on a curved section of I-895, left the roadway, smacked into a lamppost and cleared a three-foot-high Jersey barrier.
Although it was too early to determine the truck's speed, police said it clearly was going fast.
"You're not going to go over that wall at 10 miles per hour," said Gary McLhinney, chief of the Maryland State Transportation Authority Police.
McLhinney said there was no sign that the tanker was forced off the road by another vehicle, and police were not treating the crash site as a crime scene.
A driver who stopped just short of the wreckage, Thomas Hooper Jr., 34, of Randallstown, said he saw the tanker fall and explode. The vehicles in front of him drove right into the fireball, "and then they were gone," Hooper said.
Dwane Roberts, 43, a trucker from Baltimore, also watched the crash. "The poor people in there, they didn't have a chance," Roberts said.
Authorities said they may not know the identities of the victims until they are reported missing by friends or relatives. Police searched the wreckage for vehicle identification numbers.
