Houston loop 610 closed

Houston Loop 610 on the west part of Houston in the Bellaire area has been closed for 6 hours. A tanker is over turned and gasoline is being pumped. 2000 gal of gasoline has made it to the storm sewers and they have 3000 gal of gas to pump out of the truck. They have punched 6 holes in the upside of the truck to put the pump into a second tanker. Avoid the west side of Houston. It's going to be several hours even when the tank truck is hauled off because of the clean up.

 

The accident happened about 11am and the loop has been closed since and looks to be several more hours before it can be opened. The fear is that there could be a fire in reverse with the sewer system back toward the truck. There was 7k gallons of fuel. They have had trouble pumping it and had to use a method that has not been used before since the trad. way wasn't working. I'm not sure what the regular way would be, but the valves are not skyward but toward the ground. They have been foaming it since the first response. Shots from the tv chopper look like a sea of white with a truck stuck in the middle of it. This is spring break start, plus a Friday, plus the Houston Rodeo is going on in town. Traffic is really bad, would be an understatement.

 

Yea just opened 1 minute ago..

http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/story?section=news/local&id=7327293

 

That video was at the 4pm news. By 6pm it was really screwed up.

 

It was reported that he was making a U turn...and some of those under pass U turns are quite sharp and have a curb. My guess is he was going a little too fast and clipped the curb and he just went on over.