By Sara Shepherd and Joyce Tsai
The Kansas City Star
Copyright 2008 The Kansas City Star
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Heavy rain pelted the metropolitan area Wednesday evening, contributing to an ambulance rollover and a six-vehicle highway wreck that sent three to the hospital.
The heaviest rain was reported close to rush hour, when emergency crews across the area responded to a string of stalled cars.
The six-vehicle Kansas City, Kan., wreck happened in two parts — a two-car collision in the westbound lanes and a pileup involving a fire truck in the eastbound lanes of Interstate 70 just west of Interstate 435.
The inclement weather “played a big role,” said Assistant Chief Craig Duke of the Kansas City, Kan., Fire Department.
“There was torrential rain, visibility was reduced. ... Water on the road made driving a bit perilous,” he said.
About 6:15 p.m., firefighters were dispatched to a minor accident in the westbound lanes.
However, Duke said, the wreck first was reported to be on the other side of the highway, so the fire truck pulled up in the eastbound lanes. The truck stopped in the innermost lanes, and firefighters jumped the concrete barrier to help the victims.
Firefighters were on the other side of the wall when an eastbound car hit another car from behind, pushing it into the fire truck.
The second car then careened into the outside lane, hitting another vehicle and pushing it off the highway.
Three people were taken by ambulance to a hospital, but none of their injuries was considered life-threatening, Duke said.
In Overland Park, the driver of an ambulance lost control in heavy rain and overturned while entering U.S. 69 from 119th Street just after 6 p.m., according to the Overland Park Fire Department.
The three crew members aboard were taken to a hospital, treated and released. The ambulance was not responding to an emergency at the time of the wreck, and no patients were aboard.Rain came down in a heavy burst of 2 to 2 1/2 inches in 15 to 20 minutes about 6 p.m. Wednesday, said Suzanne Fortin, the science and operations officer at the National Weather Service in Pleasant Hill.
It caused local flooding of some roads in the Northeast Bottoms area and in the Shoal Creek area, north of Gladstone, during rush hour, as well as areas just south of I-435 and I-70 in Jackson County, she said.
Vehicles were reported stranded by high water at Westport Road and Southwest Trafficway in Kansas City and at Mill and Lightburne streets in Liberty.