“Fog and Smoke Lead to Dozens Hurt in Deadly Louisiana Highway Pileups”

Thick fog and smoke from near­by fires caused mul­ti­ple crash­es along a busy Louisiana inter­state on Mon­day, result­ing in at least two deaths and injur­ing over 30 peo­ple, author­i­ties reported.

The acci­dents took place in both the north­bound and south­bound lanes of Inter­state 55 between Rud­dock and Man­chac. Three trac­tor-trail­ers col­lid­ed in sep­a­rate crash­es, with two being com­plete­ly engulfed in burn­ing flames. 

Around 100 dri­vers were left strand­ed on the closed high­way as deputies rushed on foot to reach the mul­ti­ple crash sites along the fog­gy three-mile stretch. 

After res­cue efforts to free injured motorists, state police par­tial­ly reopened a sec­tion of I‑55 lat­er that morn­ing to evac­u­ate unharmed dri­vers trapped in the may­hem. The haz­ardous road con­di­tions com­bined with lim­it­ed vis­i­bil­i­ty dur­ing the marsh­land fires made for a dead­ly day on Louisiana’s busy I‑55.