Bensalem, PA – Traffic accidents involving multiple tractor trailers and dozens of cars completely blocked one side of the Pennsylvania Turnpike outside Philadelphia on Friday and caused some injuries.
Subscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
The crashes were reported just after 8 a.m., about five hours after a storm that dropped a foot of snow in the area finally moved out. Speed restrictions enacted during the storm had been lifted at 6 a.m., but motorists said the roadway was very slick at the time of the crash.
Several tractor-trailers and dozens of cars were involved in a series of accidents that backed up traffic for miles between the Bensalem and Willow Grove exits.
Turnpike spokesman Bill Capone told WPVI-TV that some injuries had been reported but were said to be minor. He says state police and other personnel were trying to attend to anyone injured and that reopening the road would take a while. Drivers were advised to use alternate routes and expect heavy delays.
David Hill, 27, was about a mile back and had turned his car off to save gas. Given the nearest exit was about 2 1/2 miles away, he anticipated being there for hours.
“There’s no possible way,” he said. “I’m stuck.”
Hill, who works for a wealth management company, said he wasn’t surprised there was an accident.
“I got on the turnpike and it was nothing but ice,” he said. “I was very surprised at the condition of it. Normally the turnpike is one of the first roads that’s cleared, but today I was driving on solid ice.”
I drove on the Belt Parkway at 11AM this morning. I counted 16 cars on the side of the road with flat tires.
Good going deblasio. By not making the plows work all night, you created the conditions that helped make those potholes. Now it will cost the city more $$ to fix what you just fixed last week. And who do you think will pay for the repairs in the long run? The taxpayers.
Schumer refused to help make the Belt Parkway an interstate highway, and we lost Federal funds bacause of that. As I recall, he did not want to help the Republican administration. Anoter prime example of democrats at work.