Multiple Chain Reaction pileups on Pa Turnpike in Philly area

[ARMOURERERIC]

On involves 100 cars near Bensalem

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/pennsylvania-turnpike-turned-parking-lot-100-car-pileup-article-1.1614363

[Henry]

Yet another reason that people should stay at home if they don't have to go out! Unfortunately, some will never learn...

[Brandon]

That's why one should never tailgate or follow too closely at any time, and especially during a snow or ice event.

[jeffandnicole]

The problem with this incident is people are thinking the roads were snow & ice covered.  They weren't.  The roads were plowed and running smoothly - they were just wet.  The temp must've dropped a few degrees around 8am under sunny skies, which in itself is unusual, and created the black ice conditions.  (I noticed the right shoulder wasn't plowed for some reason, so it remains to be seen if that had anything to do with the accident)

Say what you want, but admit to yourself - if the roads are wet, you're not slowing down much.  Even if you're thinking there could be black ice, are you going to drive 15 mph looking for that black ice?  It's one of those occurrences that once it occurred, it occurred quickly and there wasn't much people could do.

These accidents were chain accidents, so tailgating didn't necessarily have anything to do with it.  If a car slides on ice, that car could simply slide into the adjoining lane hitting a passing vehicle.  Traffic is slowing down, and as naturally happens, people get close to each other (you don't stop 6 car lengths behind someone else in a traffic jam).  The original accident may have occurred several vehicles away.  They hit someone else, someone hits someone else, someone hit someone else, then that person hits you...then you slide into someone else.

Everyone not involved blames tailgating, cell phones, and not paying attention to the road.  People on the road that got hit blame the person that hit them.  And the person (people) that caused the accidents blame the lack of salt on the roads. So...how about that...no one did anything wrong!  It was always someone else's fault!

[jemacedo9]

To add to that, the Turnpike had speed reductions down to 45MPH during the storm on Thurs...those were LIFTED at 6AM today, 2 hrs before the accident...which makes me think that the road was relatively clear.  The PA Turnpike normally does a very good job of clearing the road. 

I think that a rare temp drop is probably the probably the root cause.

[cpzilliacus]

Philly.com Pileup on eastbound Pa. Turnpike, 30 reported injuries

Irina Appelton was part of that chain reaction, too. Her black Jeep was rear-ended as she slammed on the brakes, she said. That caused her car to subsequently catapult into Connell's.

But details were tough to remember for Appelton, 52, from Glenside. Everything happened so quickly, and in the midst of the collisions, her airbag deployed, preventing her from seeing anything, she said.

What she did remember was that "the whole road was nothing but ice" before the collisions. As she picked pieces of her shattered tail lights out of her shoes, she said, "It's just really, really bad."

[akotchi]

The section of the eastbound lanes where the primary crash occurred is an area that has a long sound wall along the outside, which might have left these lanes in a shadowy area, where ice may have not fully melted.

Some of the reports also suggested that sun glare might have played a part in the secondary crashes.

I first heard about it around 9:00 a.m.  The lanes were finally reopened around 3:30 p.m. this afternoon.

[cpzilliacus]

The section of the eastbound lanes where the primary crash occurred is an area that has a long sound wall along the outside, which might have left these lanes in a shadowy area, where ice may have not fully melted.

Maybe I am being unreasonable here, but it seems to me that the PTC maintenance forces, given that they maintain the Pike and presumably its interchanges (and nothing else), should (perhaps) have been prepared for this situation, and have massively salted/sanded this segment?

Some of the reports also suggested that sun glare might have played a part in the secondary crashes.

I believe that, even though I have never driven this part of the Pennsylvania Turnpike early in the morning.  I-66 in Fairfax County, Va. (a road that I have driven in the A.M. and P.M. peak commute periods more than I want to admit) has several spots on the eastbound side where the sun angle can be horrendous, and there seem to be a lot of crashes (fortunately, mostly minor) in those sunny areas on fall and winter mornings.

I first heard about it around 9:00 a.m.  The lanes were finally reopened around 3:30 p.m. this afternoon.

Considering how many crashed vehicles they had to deal with, that seems pretty fast.

[jeffandnicole]

The section of the eastbound lanes where the primary crash occurred is an area that has a long sound wall along the outside, which might have left these lanes in a shadowy area, where ice may have not fully melted.

Maybe I am being unreasonable here, but it seems to me that the PTC maintenance forces, given that they maintain the Pike and presumably its interchanges (and nothing else), should (perhaps) have been prepared for this situation, and have massively salted/sanded this segment?

Being that the area has experienced five or more 6 inch and greater snowfalls this year alone with this being the only incident of this nature, I think it shows how unusual of an occurrence this was.

Numerous things may have happened: Wind may have blown snow onto the highway, causing it to freeze up (looking at pictures in the Philly Inquirer, this appears to be the most likely culprit). A truck could have lost snow from its roof onto the highway and froze.  The salt and salting trucks can be temporal bitches as well...a chunk of salt or debris may have clogged the spreader, or salt may have temporarily stopped coming out of the spreader. The truck could be spreading fine for miles, but just a few moments of a lack of salt would allow a short segment of roadway to remain untreated, or treated less than ideally, until another salting truck can access the area.

Remember, all indications appear to be traffic was traveling this area with no issues for several hours, between after the snowfall and plowing/salting operations, to before this incident.

In this incident, it doesn't appear to be miles of iced roadways...rather, just a few spots of several hundred feet each...which is enough to cause the accidents that occurred. To further that point, after the most eastbound accident were cleared, the cars behind that area that were basically trapped were finally free to go, until the next series of accidents were accessible by the tow trucks. One report I saw said a company's entire fleet of 60 towing vehicles was used to help clear the damaged vehicles, so there was plenty of equipment available to clear the road relatively quickly.

There were a few other accidents on the Turnpike as well that morning, many miles away, that may have been weather related as well.

 

[jeffandnicole]

At least class wasn't cancelled...

http://www.nj.com/mercer/index.ssf/2014/02/amid_chaos_of_pa_turnpike_crash_hun_school_teacher_holds_class_via_tablet.html#incart_river_default

[PHLBOS]

The one question that nobody seems to be publicly or officially asking is why did only the PA Turnpike ice-up but none of the other roads and highways (US 1 & PA 611) in the immediate vicinity experience similar... at least none that were reported?

Yes, salt supplies and snow removal budgets have been strained this year; but that's across the board (regardless of which agency/municipality maintains the road); but it clearly appears that the PTC dropped the ball in terms of pretreating the Turnpike in this area.

Thankfully, there were no fatalities from last Friday's pile-up; but that's no reason not to have a thorough investigation into PTC. 

Should the PTC scream that lack of funds (for salt/brine/whatever) was the cause for the poor pre-treatment; IMHO, Gov. Corbett should finally sign an executive order abolishing Act 44.  Traditionally, toll roads are better treated in winter than their non-tolled counterparts; that certainly wasn't the case here.   

[jeffandnicole]

Pre-treating the road has nothing to do with it.  Pre-treatment works for the first inch or two of snowfall.  After the brine has gotten wet and washed away (which it would do when it melts the snow), it's no longer effective. 

Since this storm started Wednesday evening, pre-treatment would have lost any sort of effectiveness overnight Wednesday into Thursday, way before this incident Friday morning.

[vdeane]

Don't they continue treating overnight?  NYSDOT and NYSTA plows/salt trucks operate 24/7

[cpzilliacus]

Don't they continue treating overnight?  NYSDOT and NYSTA plows/salt trucks operate 24/7

Certainly the state highway agencies in Maryland, Virginia and D.C. do.  Even the National Park Service does, though there was some recent controversy associated with the way that NPS dealt with the recent snowfalls.

The Maryland Transportation Authority believes in overwhelming and unrelenting response to anything freezing falling on its roads.

[PHLBOS]

Pre-treating the road has nothing to do with it.  Pre-treatment works for the first inch or two of snowfall.  After the brine has gotten wet and washed away (which it would do when it melts the snow), it's no longer effective.

In no particular order:

1.  The Turnpike's icing up (& related pile-up) occurred long after the snowstorm had passed and after the snow was cleared off the travel lanes.  The (pre)treatment measures I was referring to was in reference to dealing with the road after the massive snow was cleared off.  If pre-treatment is not the proper word with respect to the context I was trying to convey in the above, I apologize.

2.  I will say this again, there were/are other roads (and even highways) in the same general area and yet the icing-up did not occur on any of those roads that Friday morning.  The only unique element of the Turnpike here is the agency that deals with the snow removal & deicing (or icing prevention proceedures in this case)... the PTC.  All the other roads in the area are handled by either the local municipalities or PennDOT.   OTOH, had several roads (in addition to the Turnpike) iced over at the same time that morning, then the "these things happen" answer/reasoning might have more validity.

3.  Any argument regarding the areas of the Turnpike icing-up in shaded areas (due to the shadowing of the sound walls) still points to the PTC's handling of the road that is still wet and subject to possible freezing.  Like the Turnpike itself, those sound walls (and related shadows) have been there for decades and has endurred several severe winters.  In the near-24 years I've lived in the Delaware Valley, I don't ever recall a massive black-ice-related pile-up occurring only on one road (that wasn't an elevated viaduct like most of I-95 is in Philly) and well after a snowstorm/blizzard passing.

[jeffandnicole]

1.  If pre-treatment is not the proper word with respect to the context I was trying to convey in the above, I apologize.

Just eliminate the pre.  During and after the storm, terms would be treating (or treated), spreading, spreading material, etc.

As for #2 & #3 (and getting back to cp's comment), media reports last week indicated the Turnpike stopped their plowing/salting operations about 6am.  Between 6am and about 7:30am, no one seems to have indicated the driving conditions were that bad.  It appears the conditions got worse after 7:30, with the roads icing up closer to 8am.  It also seemed to have occurred in a fairly small area of the turnpike. 

I had mentioned before that these salting trucks can have issues on occasion - salt jams the spreader, salt may have stopped coming out for a short bit, stuff like that.  It's possible this small area of the turnpike wasn't treated as well as other areas of the turnpike. 

It's entirely possible as well that the Turnpike called back their trucks too early, rather than continuing to treat and spot-treat the roadways.  Looking at the pics, the shoulder was snow-covered in that area, so there definitely appeared to be more work to do, even if it was the result of drifting snow (which is a pain to deal with because it is so light and fluffy). PennDOT may have continued spreading their roads.  Additionally, I recall an article a while back in the Philly Inquirer that said the turnpike was reducing the amount of salt they were spreading.  The article was written prior to this season, so it's unrelated to the salt crisis.  I'll try to locate that article.

[Chris19001]

I drove the Turnpike earlier that morning going westbound/northbound from Ft Washington Industrial Park (a few miles to the west of where the accidents occured) to Lansdale.  For what it's worth, those segments of the turnpike were excellent in comparison to the secondary roads both before and after my Turnpike travel. 
If the affected segment's conditions were similar to the part I travel regularly, I suspect the road was slick and excessive speed played a hand in the chain reaction. 
As others said, once the first person had to slam their brakes the rest of the pile up was all but guaranteed.

[Brandon]

I drove the Turnpike earlier that morning going westbound/northbound from Ft Washington Industrial Park (a few miles to the west of where the accidents occured) to Lansdale.  For what it's worth, those segments of the turnpike were excellent in comparison to the secondary roads both before and after my Turnpike travel. 
If the affected segment's conditions were similar to the part I travel regularly, I suspect the road was slick and excessive speed played a hand in the chain reaction. 
As others said, once the first person had to slam their brakes the rest of the pile up was all but guaranteed.

There's the main problem.  Regardless of speed, slamming on the brakes when the road might be icy or slick is a very, very bad idea.  Use your accelerator to moderate your speed, not your brake pedal.

[roadman]

PTC conducting investigation into incident, legislative committee calls for hearing as well.

http://www.paturnpike.com/Press/2014/20140221124155.htm