February 10, 2010

UPDATE:

Hundreds of live turkeys toppled onto the side of the road Wednesday morning when the tractor trailer carrying them hit black ice and jack-knifed on Route 151 in Nelson County.

The accident happened around 9:30 a.m. near Bland Wade Road on Route 151.

Emergency officials said more than 900 turkeys were on board headed to be processed in Harrisonburg.

They also said Route 151 was covered in black ice early Monday morning.

"Today, the road was covered with ice, about a half inch to three-quarters of an inch of solid ice," Rockfish Valley Fire Chief David Graves said.

The driver of the tractor trailer was not injured. He was able to drive away with some turkeys still in their cages. The rest laid on the side of the road waiting.

"The company that they were working for, which is Circle S Farm, has a recovery team that will be coming out here to pick up the cages and the turkeys that are in the road," said Ray Uttaro of Nelson County Emergency Services.

The recovery team picked the turkeys up one by one and put them back in their cages.

Meanwhile, traffic passed through one lane until the accident was cleared.

"We had traffic blocked up for a couple hours here," Uttaro said. "Part of that was the recovery of the tractor trailer."

Uttaro said Route 151 is notorious for having a lot of curves and that this is not the first time he's seen an accident on this stretch of the road.

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A jack-knifed tractor trailer caused a backup on Route 151 Wednesday after its cargo, live turkeys, was dumped onto the roadway.

The tractor trailer carrying more than 900 turkeys was driving down Route 151 near Bland Wade Road when it hit black ice on the roadway, causing it to jack-knife. About three-quarters of the turkeys were ejected from the tractor trailer.

No one was injured, although some of the turkeys may have been killed. A recovery team is loading the surviving turkeys one-by-one to a new tractor trailer, which will take them to Harrisonburg.

Crews continue to clean up the roadway, which is currently open to one lane of traffic.