HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- A Houston man is dead after a bizarre accident on the Pierce Elevated.
Tuesday around 6 a.m., a driver going southbound on Pierce Elevated near Houston Avenue lost one of its tires. Police said the tire sheared off at the axle of the truck, then crossed over the barrier wall between lanes and slammed into an SUV going northbound.
SkyEye was over the scene moments after the accident. The driver of the SUV has been identified as Abdias Layva.
According to traffic investigators, metal fatigue is to blame for the tire coming off of the F-150.
There were big delays on both sides of the highway, shutting down the northbound lanes of the Gulf Freeway. Those lanes have since reopened.
At one point, Eyewitness News Traffic Reporter Katherine Whaley said the crash slowed traffic down to 5 mph.
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HOUSTON, TEXAS – A tire flew off a pickup truck and went into oncoming traffic, killing a driver on I-45 in downtown Houston early Tuesday.
The incident blocked all northbound lanes of the Pierce Elevated/I-45 near Bagby for about three hours. That's where investigators and wrecker drivers were looking over the victim's SUV.
According to the Houston Police Department, the incident happened just before 6 a.m. when the tire broke off of an older Ford F-150 pickup traveling in the southbound lanes near San Jacinto. The tire bounced and flew over the middle concrete barrier into the northbound lanes striking another vehicle.
“This wheel, this entire wheel assembly, wasn’t just a tire, breaks off the vehicle, bounces into the northbound lanes, and actually strikes a second vehicle in the windshield, directly, unfortunately over the driver of that vehicle,” HPD Capt. William McPherson said.