I-81 CRASH DURING A SNOW SQUALL IN WATERTOWN, NY: TIPPED-OVER 18-WHEELER TRUCK CRUSHES SUBARU BUT, MIRACULOUSLY, NO ONE IS HURT

I-81 crash DURING A SNOW SQUALL IN WATERTOWN, NY: TIPPED-OVER 18-WHEELER truck crushes Subaru but, miraculously, no one is hurt

By CRAIG FOX
TIMES STAFF WRITER

PUBLISHED: WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 31, 2014 AT 6:41 PM

UPDATED: WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 31, 2014 AT 11:28 PM

ADAMS, NY — Unable to see much during a snow squall on Wednesday afternoon, Justin Martin just hoped to find some place to land his 80,000-pound rig without hurting anyone on Interstate 81.

The Belleville, Ont., trucker did what he could to maneuver the southbound tractor-trailer, but it tipped over on its side, landing on a four-wheel-drive Subaru and trapping its driver, Mr. Martin said from a Watertown hotel room.

Miraculously, the Subaru’s unidentified driver walked away from the crash that resulted in a chain-reaction accident involving about 20 damaged cars and dozens more off the side of the highway a little after 2 p.m.

No major injuries were reported, according to a Jefferson County dispatcher. The accident caused the snow-covered stretch of interstate between Exits 42 and 41 to be closed for more than two hours.

Mr. Martin, 46, whose rig was carrying 5,000-pound rolls of paper downstate, is amazed that the man in the Subaru survived with only some cuts on his hands and a possible arm injury.

“If the car ended up two feet either way, two feet closer to the back or two feet closer to the front of the truck, he’d be dead,” said Mr. Martin, with his voice breaking. “It’s just crazy.”

His truck “whip lashed,” starting to spin from the back and then causing the entire rig to flip over on its side, he recalled. Mr. Martin — who has driven rigs for 10 years and many times safely along that wintry stretch of Interstate 81 for the past seven years — said he believes there was nothing he could do to prevent the crash. A few seconds before, other truck drivers radioed to “brake check” because a small car was stopped in the middle of the lane just ahead, he said.

Sackets Harbor resident Kelly E. Reinhardt was in the middle of it all as she was driving to Syracuse to watch a basketball game at the Carrier Dome between the Orange and Cornell.

She said rescue workers had to cut through the metal paneling of the Subaru to free the unidentified driver from the wreckage. A man with medical experience, who happened to be passing by, tried to keep the Subaru’s driver calm while he was still trapped, witnesses said.

The Subaru’s driver finally climbed from his wrecked vehicle, walked through the interior of the trailer and out the back to an awaiting ambulance, she said.

“Oh, my goodness,” she said. “It was crazy.”

Unable to stop, her Volvo smacked into the tractor-trailer, sitting on its side in the road, she said. Somehow, both she and her sister, Karen, a visitor from Boston, escaped injury.

Her collision occurred just seconds after the car ended up underneath the tractor-trailer; she had no chance to avoid them, she said.

“There were cars all over,” she said, adding that her car’s side was extensively damaged and still at the accident site about 5 p.m. Wednesday. She and her sister hitched rides with firefighters, tow-truck drivers and a state trooper before being picked up by her father, Lonnie I. Reinhardt, at the McDonald’s in Adams.

“My sister was nervous,” Ms. Reinhardt said. “She kept telling me we shouldn’t go to Syracuse because the weather was bad, but I didn’t listen.”

Instead of going to the Syracuse game, she and her sister ended up at Coleman’s Corner for dinner in Watertown on New Year’s Eve.

“I’m still in a fog,” she said.

The interstate reopened at about 4:30 p.m.

Mr. Martin’s rig, owned by ITS freight in Belleville, was towed to Watertown. His co-workers were expected to pick him up and take him back to Canada on Thursday. He suffered a shoulder injury. The trailer is a total loss, but the truck itself was only slightly damaged, he said.

State police in Watertown and at Troop D headquarters in Oneida could not identify the driver of the Subaru.

After the accident, the two men hugged while sharing an ambulance ride to Samaritan Medical Center.

“I looked into his eyes when we were in the ambulance and he’s a good man,” Mr. Martin said. “That’s why something saved him. He’s too good to go now. It wasn’t his time.”