Arkansas Emergency Crews Stay Busy in Midst of Ice
Jan. 10--Emergency personnel wound down a blitz of activity after much of the ice that caused several wrecks and injuries Wednesday melted away when above-freezing temperatures moved into western Arkansas early Thursday.
Although official statistics were not yet available Thursday, the most problematic areas were along Interstate 40 in Franklin County and Interstate 540 in Crawford County, said Lt. Bryan Davis with Arkansas State Police Troop H in Fort Smith.
"It's a lot better today, although some of the main roads are still patchy and the secondary roads are still in tough shape," Davis said Thursday.
Throughout the day and into the night Wednesday, tractor-trailers that jackknifed or slid off the roadway snarled traffic along I-40. Areas of any elevation posed the biggest threat to the large vehicles, Davis said.
A tractor-trailer that was stuck in ice blocked traffic in Mulberry; an overturned tractor-trailer in Ozark blocked off westbound traffic. Arkansas State Police Troop J in Clarksville had multiple stalled tractor-trailers leave traffic at a standstill all the way from near Coal Hill to Ozark for hours along I-40, Davis said.
Sgt. Greg Smith with Troop J said troopers worked collision after collision from about 10:30 a.m. Wednesday to about 3:30 a.m. Thursday. Smith estimated that Troop J responded to at least 41 accidents throughout their six-county coverage area.
Additional problems crept up after drivers began to divert to secondary roads along the interstate to avoid the traffic tie-ups on I-40. Many of those roads had not been sanded and were not designed for heavy traffic, resulting in multiple wrecks, Davis said.
Crews had to get creative in order to reach the scenes of some accidents. State police escorted highway crews against the flow of traffic to get to a few of the collisions along I-40 near Franklin County, Davis said.
A state police vehicle was damaged en route to the scene of an accident. The patrol car was involved in a minor collision with another vehicle on an icy bridge near Howard Hill Road just outside Fort Smith. No injuries were reported, Davis said.
A multiple-vehicle collision was reported just south of the Bobby Hopper Tunnel on I-540 early Thursday, said Chad Adams, District 4 engineer with the Arkansas State Highway and Transportation Department.
"It cleared up fairly quickly," Adams said. "It went from zero percent clear at 8 o'clock to 100 percent clear at 11."
Most of the district's main roads were clear by Thursday afternoon. The department's crews set out to tackle the secondary roads that continued to be problematic, Adams said.
In Crawford County, several secondary roads continued to pose travel risks into Thursday. Crawford County emergency manager Dennis Gilstrap said Barcelona Road, northern Liberty Hill, the Locke Township and Rock Creek Road were particularly dangerous spots in the county.
A cinder truck carrying sand slid off of Arkansas 348 East near Mountainburg early Thursday. Crews used a grader and a backhoe to unload all the sand it was carrying and get the vehicle out of a ditch, Gilstrap said.
Power outages also posed problems in the county, as more than 900 outages were reported Thursday afternoon in Van Buren, according to an Arkansas Valley Electric outages map. Crawford County's road department was one of the buildings that lost power for several hours, Gilstrap said.
In Sebastian County, things slowed down in the late afternoon Wednesday, said Jeff Turner, Sebastian County emergency manager. Turner said he was not aware of any major weather-related accidents that happened out in the county late Wednesday into early Thursday.
"I think the schools being out and people staying home helped a lot," Turner said.
Fort Smith police responded to about 50 traffic accidents in the city Wednesday from 9 a.m. to midnight. Police responded to about 15 wrecks Thursday, according to information provided by Sgt. Daniel Grubbs. One of those wrecks with injury happened about 4 p.m. right outside Sparks Regional Medical Center.
Emergency rooms in Fort Smith kept busy throughout the night Wednesday and into early Thursday. Sparks reported more than 300 ER visits since the severe weather hit, with 70 of those being weather-related injuries from falls and car crashes, according to information from Alicia Agent, Sparks spokeswoman.
Laura Keep, Mercy Fort Smith spokeswoman, said the hospital saw 56 patients who started coming in about 11 a.m. Wednesday with weather-related injuries. Extra staff came in to help with about a 40 percent increase in emergency department volume.
Extra staff also came in to help with patients at Sparks. The hazardous conditions prevented a number of patients from being discharged as planned; some hospital staff members were unable to get to the hospital, and others weren't able to get home. The hospital provided beds for staff members who had to stay overnight, Chief Nursing Executive Shelly Weilenman said.
Meteorologist Joe Sellers with the National Weather Service in Tulsa said a 10th of an inch of ice accumulation was reported in Fort Smith, with a quarter-inch reported about five miles northeast of Alma and a quarter-inch reported in Ozark. Fort Smith recorded 0.02 inches of precipitation Wednesday, Sellers said.
With high temperatures set in the 50s for today, any of the remaining ice in the region should disappear, although rain is likely, Sellers said.
Copyright 2014 - Times Record, Fort Smith, Ark.
