(Photo: Mark Vergari/The Journal News)
I-87 crash kills 2 in Ramapo; SB lanes closed
Jane Lerner, jlerner@lohud.com 5:44 p.m. EDT August 21, 2015
The crash occurred just before 10 a.m. Friday near the ramp for Exit 14B
RAMAPO, NEW YORK
— The southbound New York State Thruway remains closed in Ramapo, snarling traffic throughout the region, after a multi-truck crash Friday morning that killed two people.
State police said all northbound lanes are open, but that traffic is at a near standstill thanks to rubbernecking and the typical Friday rush. Approaching 5 p.m., police were unable to say when the southbound roadway might be opened.
Police said the crash was triggered shortly before 10 a.m. when a northbound truck apparently crossed into oncoming traffic in the southbound lanes near exit 14B. One tractor-trailer, two box trucks and one other vehicle were involved, state police said. They did not say which truck caused the collision.
Police are diverting traffic off the highway at Exit 15 in Mahwah, New Jersey, as the accident investigation continues. Traffic is stop-and-go on Route 59 westbound between Spring Valley and Suffern as drivers seek alternative routes.
Drivers trying to avoid the Tappan Zee Bridge can cross the Bear Mountain Bridge in northern Westchester and Rockland counties, or the George Washington Bridge in Manhattan and New Jersey.
The crash claimed the lives of two people in one of the trucks involved. A passenger was pronounced dead at the scene, and the driver was cut out of the truck and taken in extremely critical condition to Good Samaritan Hospital in Suffern, where he was pronounced dead.
Another person, a 43-year-old man, was admitted to Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center, according to a hospital official. A 12-year-old was also being treated at the Suffern hospital but will likely be released before the end of the day.
People stuck in traffic northbound, wait outside of their vehicles as firefighters, police and ambulance personnel work at the scene of a double fatal tractor trailer accident on the southbound New York State Thruway in Ramapo, Aug. 21, 2015. Mark Vergari/The Journal News
The crash led numerous cars and trucks to become stuck between Exits 15 and 14B. Just before 2:30 p.m. police began to let drivers who had been stuck for hours turn around, head north in the southbound lanes, and get off the Thruway at Exit 15.
Shane Zansitis, 4, has been stuck with his mother and baby sister in traffic on I-87 for more than 3 hours. (Photo: Marnie Zansitis)
Marnie Zansitis was trapped in the traffic jam for nearly four hours. The Mahwah resident had entered the Thruway at Exit 15 just before the crash occurred. When she spoke to The Journal News early Friday afternoon, she and her two children, Shane, 4, and Danica, 4½ months, had been stuck in her Toyota without food for hours.
"I'm totally freaking out right now," she said. "I have no food, no formula for the baby. Nothing."
Danica had a full bottle before breakfast and napped much of the time, her mother said. Shane, whom she was taking to child care in Northvale, New Jersey, started to get fussy, Zansitis said.
"This is a nightmare," she said. "I do this drive all the time. It usually takes 20 minutes."
A look from above at the aftermath of a 3-truck accident on the Thruway in Ramapo. WNBC New York
Steve Rothaupt, 26, of Chestnut Ridge said he was heading to Suffern for his next stop as a Snapple salesman when he got on the Thruway northbound in Nanuet at about 10:15 a.m.
“My father is a firefighter in Tallman, and my mother texted me to tell me, ‘Don’t get on the Thruway,’” Rothaupt said. “But that was unfortunately about a minute or two late.”
Rothaupt added that his father, also named Steve, responded to the incident. The younger Rothaupt tweeted at 12:45 p.m.: “Sitting in my car with it off on the thruway. That's how much we aren't moving.” About three and a half hours later, he finally got off the highway, he said.
Local roads in Suffern and Sloatsburg also were jammed as drivers tried to avoid the Thruway.
Randi Colton, who was trying to get home to Sloatsburg from Suffern around 12:30 p.m, encountered heavy traffic on Route 202, East Maple Avenue and Route 17.
"It was just bumper-to-bumper," she said.
Emergency agencies that responded to the crash site included Rockland Paramedics and firefighters from Hillburn and Tallman, who handled the extrication. Rockland's HazMat team was also at the site Friday afternoon helping to transfer fuel out of the overturned trucks so it wouldn't get on the roadway.
State police said the Commercial Vehicle Enforcement Unit and Collision Reconstruction Unit had also responded.Staff writer Akiko Matsuda contributed to this repor