Plow Slams Cars With Jet Of Slushy Snow On Ohio Turnpike

A truck driver's dash cam caught just one of multiple terrifying crashes caused by a fast-moving snow plow throwing a geyser of ice and snow into oncoming traffic on the Ohio Turnpike in Erie County on Sunday. Ohio State Highway Patrol say at least 40 vehicles were damaged and at least a dozen people were injured as a result of the slush jet.

As if driving isn't nerve-wracking enough, especially in the winter. Random shit flying through my windshield out of nowhere is one of my biggest fears on the road and there are plenty of examples already to populate my nightmares. Now I get to add hundreds of pounds of snow and ice to the list. Truck driver Michael Lemon told News5Cleveland what happened out near milepost 114 on the Ohio Turnpike:

"I've never seen anything like that," Lemon said. "I didn't know how to react, I was just dumbfounded that somebody could be so reckless."

The Ohio Turnpike is managed by an independent company, not the Ohio Department of Transportation, and one of the plow trucks employed by the highway was seen on the video traveling the same speed as surrounding cars, around 70 mph, as it cleared snow from the road.

Because the truck was traveling at such a high speed, the snow was thrown to the other side of the highway, landing on cars driving in the opposite direction.

"A lot of them didn't even know what to do, they just they kind of tried to stay in their own lane and hope to weather it," Lemon said.

The car that swerved off the side of the road at the end of that clip had a beach-ball sized hole in its windshield, Lemon told News5. When he checked on the occupants, he found them covered in blood. The snow from the plow even damaged his big rig. He estimated that the plow driver was going 70 miles per hour.

The Ohio Turnpike and Infrastructure Commission announced Monday morning that the driver was placed on administrative leave and will submit to mandatory drug and alcohol testing as it investigated the incident.