Ben Leubsdorf
The Concord Monitor
CANTERBURY, N.H. — About 40 vehicles including a school bus were involved in a pileup on Interstate 93 in Canterbury during a brief snowstorm yesterday, sending 10 people to the hospital, officials said.
Emergency personnel responded to the crash just north of Exit 18 around 12:30 p.m. and shut down both southbound lanes for about an hour and a half, first opening one lane and later the second as crews cleared damaged vehicles from the road.
There were no fatalities, said Canterbury fire Chief Peter Angwin.
“It was one of those pileup things,” he said, with “30-plus” vehicles sliding off the highway and into each other as they rounded a curve in the road.
Angwin described road conditions at the time of the accident as “real icy,” with snow falling.
Ten people were taken to Concord Hospital with non-life- threatening injuries, said nursing supervisor Angelic Dixon.
“We are expecting that the majority of the people will be treated and released,” she said. “That’s very good news.”
The road was covered in ice and “extremely slippery” when troopers arrived, the state police said in a news release. Among the approximately 40 vehicles involved was a tour bus and a small Tilton school bus. A message seeking additional information was left with the state police.
There were still about a dozen vehicles piled up on the side of the interstate about 2 p.m. as a single lane of southbound traffic began to flow again. One crashed vehicle apparently knocked over a mile marker sign at the side of the highway.
Katie Koroma was driving back to Lowell, Mass., with her three children after an admissions open house at the Tilton School when she rounded the corner and saw vehicles going off the road in the snow. Her car crashed, too, but no one was hurt.
“I just want to get home, because I’m freezing here,” she said, wrapped in a blanket at the side of the highway as flurries fell.
State troopers assisted Canterbury officials at the accident, along with emergency responders from Belmont, Chichester, Concord, Epsom, Franklin, Loudon, Penacook and Tilton-Northfield.
Copyright 2011 ProQuest Information and Learning
All Rights Reserved