Dust Storm Causes 15-Car Pileup On I-70; 2 Killed

1/20/09

Oh how awful......can't imagine what that must have been like.

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Brickman posted a bit about this in the O/O thread last night. That looked and sounded like a mess.

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Maybe I can you a more familiar picture of what happened.
I was involved in the accident. My truck is the one to the left of the red freightliner. I was headed to Lovell, WY when it happened. I seen the dust storm up ahead and started to slow down before getting to it and was still slowing down as I went into it.
At first it didnt look to bad but about 2 seconds after entering the dust storm visibility became almost zero. I noticed a big truck at a complete stop in the right hand lane and only had a split second to react. I immediatley went to the left hand lane not knowing there was already a wreck there. One of the wrecked 4 wheelers was in that left hand lane. I hit the left rear corner of the stopped big rig and the car that was in the left hand lane at the same time. The dust was so bad that I didnt even see the car until I was hitting it. As soon as I hit the car flames shot up the side of my door and side glass. I immediatley took my seat belt off and bailed out of the truck. About 2 minutes later my truck was engulfed in flames. The wind hammered down like I have never seen before. There were times when the dust got so bad that it cut out the sunlight completly and the wind never let up until the sun started going down behind the horizon. What the story did not report is that, where the wreck happened, there was a farmer in the field on the North side in a John Deer plowing his field. C'mon, its the middle of January, what could possibly be so important that he had to be plowing his field with 50+ mph winds. And yes, he was plowing directly acorss from where the wreck was. You just cant sell people common sense. There was Highway Patrol, Fire Fighters, and EMT's all trying to do their jobs in almost zero visibility and the farmer still kept on plowing his field. You would have to be totally blind not to see what was going on but he evidently didnt care because he never stopped.
I mentioned it to the HP and they said they were going to have a talk with him. Even after I bailed out of the truck I could still here traffic coming in behind. Brakes being locked up and metal being mangled. It was an awful sound. You could here but couldnt see it. The dust was so bad that it was like someone holding a sandblaster in front of your face.
I always have my CB on even if there is not chatter. Not one time did anyone get on the radio and say, "hey Westbound, back it off there is a wreck in this dust storm" but if someone had something stupid to say, as the often do, Im sure It would have came across the radio.
Before I knew what was going on, I was already part of it. The farmer may not be completly at fault because winds like that will pick up any and all dust but I feel like he contributed to it greatly.
That is a day that will be etched into my brain forever.
Maybe now, you have a better picture of what happend and I pray that no driver has to go through that. My heart goes out to the families that lost someone that day. It was a terrible thing for such a beautiful day in Colorado.

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"The difference between genius and stupidity is; genius has its limits". - Albert Einstein