2 people perished in truck inferno

Police: Blowout caused I- 40 crash

State police officials confirmed that a second person died in Wednesday’s fiery crash of a tractor- trailer rig that was hauling explosives on Interstate 40 through Franklin County.

Both victims were trapped in the cab when the truck caught fire after a front passenger- side tire blew out, sending the rig plunging off the interstate near Mulberry, police said. The westbound truck went through a guardrail and down an embankment coming to rest on Lone Elm Road, said Arkansas State Police spokesman Liz Chapman.

Authorities sent the bodies to the state Crime Laboratory for autopsies and identification, Chapman said.

A preliminary report filed by state police Trooper Ben Ibarra listed the victims as “unknown.”

The truck was hauling ammunition and smoke grenades from the U. S. Army’s Pine Bluff Arsenal to the McAlester Army Ammunition Plant in McAlester, Okla., said Randy Boren, director of the Franklin County E- 911 Center. The tractor- trailer was owned by Baggett Transportation of Birmingham, Ala.

Chapman did not confirm whether the two killed were a husband and wife.

Claiborne Crommelin, a spokesman for Baggett Transportation, said he could not comment about the accident. He would not identify who was driving the truck.

The accident occurred at 2: 15 p. m. Wednesday.

Boren said the truck’s front tire blew out as the rig was crossing an Interstate 40 overpass about 4 miles east of Mulberry.

The truck landed on its side on Lone Elm Road and its diesel tank caught fire, Boren said.

The accident happened in a rural area, so authorities did not have to evacuate any nearby homes or businesses.

“There was nobody within 3 miles of the accident,” Boren said.

Police closed I- 40 in both directions while emergency crews worked at the scene. Eastbound lanes reopened about 6: 15 p. m. Wednesday. Westbound lanes opened to traffic early Thursday morning, Boren said.

Emergency workers had doused the blaze and cleared the highway by

early evening Wednesday, but authorities had to wait to open the westbound lanes until after military officials had inspected the wreckage and hauled off the ammunition, he said.

Traffic was diverted onto U. S. 64. Eastbound traffic at first was routed off the interstate at Exit 24, but traffic began backing up, so it was later routed off at Exit 20, said Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department spokesman Danny Straessle.

Inspectors from the Highway Department’s Fort Smith division checked the overpass Wednesday night and found no structural damage,

Straessle said.

Four people have died in accidents on I- 40 in three days. In addition to the two people killed Wednesday, a man was killed in Pulaski County on Tuesday when the tractor- trailer he was driving struck the rear of another tractor- trailer that was stopped on the road because of an accident.

A Faulkner County man died Thursday when he was traveling west in the eastbound lane of I- 40 in Conway.