(Ashley, IN) -- 55-year old Franklin Grant of Ruston, Louisiana had just pulled his semi off the side of I-69 to get some water out of his sleeper, when he was rear-ended by the semi driven by 41-year old Sean Vandommelen of Middleville, Michigan.

"This morning the swift truck that you see here behind me was pulled off on the road and was just starting to roll forward when the other truck came along and clipped the trailer of the swift truck and fire exploded immediately and fully engulfed the one truck," says Steuben County Sheriff's Sergeant Phillip Nott.

Vandommelen was flown to Fort Wayne, and is listed in fair condition at Saint Joe's Burn Center with injuries to his face, arms and hands.

He was hauling rolls of carpet -- the first semi, heavy rolls of paper.

The materials gave firefighters a tough time, since they continued to smoulder for hours.

Now that all the major debris has been cleaned up frolm the northbound lanes of I-69, it's up to an outfit out of Fort Wayne called Environmental Remediation Services to clean up all the diesel fuel that was spilled.

"All the materials that need to be cleaned up, like the dirt behind the guardrail, they'll clean that up and they'll re-seed that," says Sam Sweet from INDOT.

The crash closed southbound lanes for five hours, northbound for about eleven hours.

The intense fire happened right at the Pigeon Creek bridge, which had to be inspected to make sure it was still structurally sound.

INDOT will replace the guardrail and fix parts of the pavement, since the fire burned so hot.