Friday marks one year since the deadly, chain reaction pileup crash on Interstate 35W in Fort Worth that killed six people and injured dozens more.
The preliminary report from the National Transportation Safety Board, released just days ago, puts the official tally of vehicles involved at 135.
Each of those vehicles was southbound on I-35W at about 6 a.m. on Feb. 11, 2021, when, just past the NE 28th Street overpass, they lost control and crashed on the icy highway.
Many of those vehicles were trapped between the concrete barriers that wall off the southbound managed toll lane, so there was no practical way for them to avoid crashing into the vehicles in front of them.
Of the six people who were killed, two of them had exited their vehicles on that icy morning. Paramedics later transported 36 additional people to area hospitals with various injuries.
Sydney McCoy was headed to work when she became among the very first drivers to lose control on the sheet of ice.
“Driving along I felt like I was being more cautious, driving like a granny,” McCoy said with a laugh. “The roads were fine, so you start to accelerate to a normal speed limit. And then I came over the hill and I remember just the sensation that ‘Okay, I don’t have control anymore.’”
McCoy’s SUV surprisingly only sustained minor damage from hitting the barrier wall that separates the managed toll lane from the regular southbound lanes of the interstate, but she came to a stop facing the wrong direction on the highway and was forced to watch vehicle after vehicle proceed to slam directly into one another.
“You start seeing the first car hit, and then the next one, and the tempo kept speeding up back-to-back,” McCoy recalled. “When it was all said and done, I was really surprised to learn that there were only six fatalities because you really feel like you are just witnessing one death after another. It was just awful.”
The preliminary NTSB report indicated that there is still an active investigation into what efforts were taken to treat the icy road conditions prior to the pileup. According to the report, it had been below freezing in the immediate area for 36 consecutive hours prior to the incident.
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