Logging truck plows into waiting traffic

By Robert Freeman - Chilliwack Progress - April 30, 2008

Police and emergency crews had no time to warn westbound drivers that an accident had stopped traffic on the TransCanada Highway Tuesday morning near Herrling Island.

“Before emergency service personnel were notified and could respond to this initial incident a second tractor-trailer unit hauling logs happened into the scene,” police said in a news release yesterday.

Miraculously, no one was killed when the fully-loaded logging truck came around a “blind” curve and crashed into at least seven vehicles waiting for the roadway ahead to clear after the first accident.

“Everybody involved was pretty lucky,” RCMP Const. James Halliday said at the scene Tuesday. “The driver tried to miss what he could.”

Kelowna resident Matt Stillman said he watched in horror as he saw the accident unfold in his rear-view mirror.

As the logging truck came around the blind corner, he said, the driver saw what was ahead and was “struggling to stop ... and then the whole truck did a bit of a snake” hitting a cement retaining wall on the right side of the road, then bouncing back to the left, clipping the back end of a white trailer-tractor before plowing into a blue four-door sedan with four people inside.

CN workers Don Brears and Brian Rauch, who had first aid kits with them, tended to the victims as best they could, including two females trapped in the blue sedan.

“We bandaged up the (sedan) driver and stayed with the casualties until the paramedics arrived,” Rauch said.

Brears said he did not see the accident happen.

“All I saw was a big cloud of dust and heard a big bang.”

Halliday did not know if speed was a factor in the accident, but agreed the blind corner did not give the truck driver any warning that traffic had stopped ahead.

The first accident involved a westbound grain truck that lost its trailer and went off the road just west of Herrling Island. The driver of that vehicle escaped.

About 15 minutes later the westbound logging truck struck at least seven vehicles that were waiting for the traffic to clear.

Police shut down traffic in both directions after the second accident while firefighters used the jaws of life to free those trapped in the sedan and to evacuate others to hospital.

At least nine people were injured - three seriously. The TransCanada was closed until about 8 p.m. Tuesday.

No names or other details of the injured were released by police yesterday. There was also no information on whether the driver of the logging truck will face any charges.

rfreeman@theprogress.com

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Logging truck plows into waiting traffic

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