Phone line snaps, causing multiple incidents on I-90
A “Road Work Ahead” sign was destroyed as a snapped phone cable tangled traffic on Interstate 90 near Superior on July 24. (Kathleen Woodford/Mineral Independent)
Superior Fire Chief Steve Temple examines the top of a power pole that snapped as a result of a cable being snagged by a semi-track on Interstate 90 west of Superior on July 24. (Kathleen Woodford/Mineral Independent).
Power poles snapped and cables as thick as a softball gnarled Interstate 90 on Tuesday, July 24. Vehicles just west of Superior swerved to dodge the debris littering both east and westbound lanes. Phone lines at the Superior Fire Department lit up with calls, and several members responded to the incident.
A county truck had backed into a pole along Southside Road, which parallels the freeway — causing telephone lines to dip across Interstate 90 just enough for a passing semi-truck to snag it. The truck, travelling at 70 mph, snapped the power poles on both sides of the road, which severed 400 feet of cable.
The cables contain hundreds of individual phone lines, wrapped around a large steel cable for stability. It coiled in the lanes like a giant snake when a small Honda CRV heading west became entangled and swerved off the road and crashed. However, the two women in the vehicle were not injured.
“Luckily it hit their bumper and not the windshield,” said Superior Fire Chief Steve Temple.
The calls to the station reported an incident on Southside Road, then a call about the semi-truck, and then another one regarding the Honda.
“It was a multi-vehicle incident and it’s extremely important for the first responders to understand the entire scene and evaluate what’s happening to get a status report. What do you see? What’s happening around you? In a mass casualty incident like this one, it’s what you are faced with,” said Temple.
The cable also wiped out an orange “Road Workers Ahead” sign, and the top of the power pole containing the disable cable landed on a wire fence that runs the length of the interstate.
“At the time, we didn’t know what kind of cable we were dealing with. If it was a power pole, it would have electrified the entire fence,” Temple said.
Also, throughout the incident, county workers were paving Southside Road and had just dumped a load of asphalt. If it’s not spread immediately it will harden, and so workers had to continue paving as emergency crews dealt with the mayhem.
“It was kind of surreal,” said Temple.
There were no other accidents reported, and emergency crews were able to get both lanes open within a couple of hours.