One dead, dozens hurt in multivehicle crash near Hope, B.C.

A truck driver says he’ll be haunted by the sounds of twisting metal and breaking glass after a “catastrophic” crash in British Columbia that killed one person and injured dozens more.

The crash happened just before 10 a.m. Wednesday on the Coquihalla Highway near Hope, a stretch known for treacherous winter conditions that’s about 160 kilometres east of Vancouver.

Paramedics transported two patients to hospital by air in critical condition and three patients by ground in serious but stable condition. Crews also cared for another 34 patients with non-life-threatening injuries at the scene, Emergency Health Services said.

RCMP confirmed one person died of their injuries.

Mitchell Danilak, a truck driver from Leduc, Alta., said he was driving in the slow lane and was headed down a steep, curvy hill when he saw a fellow truck driver waving his hands out the window at him as he drove by in the opposite direction.

Danilak began to slow down and was able to pull to a stop without crashing into the pileup of more than 20 vehicles in front of him, which included cars, a motor coach bus and a tractor-trailer jackknifed across a rock face, he said.

Then he said he saw a police cruiser come “flying” down the hill in the fast lane, crash into the guardrail and spin into the wreckage, followed by three other vehicles that did the same.

“It’s just catastrophic,” he said, speaking by phone from the scene on Wednesday.