Fire Down Below

Bridge Collapses In Tanker Fire
April 29, 2007

(Oakland, CA) A fiery pre-dawn tanker truck accident caused the collapse of a heavily trafficked freeway overpass near downtown today, sending hundreds of feet of concrete crashing onto a highway below and hobbling a vital Bay Area interchange.

The driver of the truck, which was carrying 8,600 gallons of gasoline, was hospitalized with second-degree burns. No other injuries were reported from the accident, which occurred at 3:42 a.m.


The accident occurred in the very heart of an unruly cloverleaf known as the MacArthur Maze, where several major arteries converge at the approach to the Bay Bridge, which connects San Francisco with the cities and suburbs that line the east side of San Francisco Bay.

The highway patrol believes that Mr. Mosqueda was heading south on an interchange of Interstate 80 when he lost control in a curve, hit a guardrail and flipped his truck on its side. The tanker exploded, sending flames hundreds of feet into the air, according to witnesses, and quickly buckled a three-lane section of Interstate 580 and caused it to collapse onto Interstate 880 some thirty feet below.

Michael Brown, the commissioner of the highway patrol, said the driver was able to escape the burning truck and apparently hailed a cab in order to go to the hospital. Mr. Brown said there was “no indication of impairment of the driver” by drugs or alcohol, but that some legal issues are outstanding for both Mr. Mosqueda, and the truck’s owner, Sabek Transportation, based in San Francisco.

At a noontime press conference held at a toll plaza near the collapse, Mr. Kempton said the heat from the fireball had likely melted the steel girders and bolts that support the concrete roadway. “If you have that kind of heat, you’re going to have this kind of reaction,” he said. “We’re not surprised this happened.”
Rebuilding the collapsed section of I-880 took nearly a decade, though Mr. Kempton called that situation “a much larger issue” involving neighborhood and environmental concerns. Mr. Kempton said he had contacted Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s office soon after the accident, and would seek federal highway funds for repairs, something he estimated would cost tens of millions of dollars. “It’s not going to be cheap,” he said.

He also pleaded for patience, saying with this kind of complex highway system, “You’re not going to have a picnic every day.”