When first responders arrived at the scene of a crash on Indiana's Sam Jones Expressway they saw the type of accident firefighters dread: A dozen crushed cars and an overturned 18-wheeler. Amazingly, there wasn't a single fatality. How?
The exclusive photos we've obtained make this Wayne Township, Indiana street look like the aftermath of a Michael Bay disaster flick. Cars with collapsed roofs. Multiple vehicles piled one on top of another like so many abandoned Matchbox cars. How could anyone survive? Better quesion — how could nobody have died?!
"When our dispatch originally received the call we heard multiple cars with possible entrapment, so when our first units arrived on the scene they saw [what's in the photos above] and it did look like multiple cars had been crashed," Wayne Township Division Chief Michael Pruitt exclusively told Jalopnik.
But upon closer inspection and after calling in a heavy rescue truck Pruitt's team realized the cars were actually crushed junk vehicles that had been loaded onto the overturned 18-wheeler. Someone u-turned in front of the truck, the truck's driver hit the brakes, and the momentum caused him to tip and dispense the junked cars onto the road.
"It was a big sigh of relief when they realized they were junk cars," said Pruitt.
Somehow, none of the cars landed on any other vehicles so the truck was the only vehicle damaged (other than the pre-damaged cars).
"I've been in the fire service for 25 years and this was the first time I've seen that big of a mess," said Pruitt.
The roadway is one of the area's major thoroughfares so heavy wrecking crews were brought in and all the vehicles were removed and the road cleaned after about two hours.
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept
Photo Credit: Wayne Township Fire Dept