Tractor-trailer hits cruiser on I-95

PALMYRA – Slush-covered roads and inattention were blamed Monday for a series of accidents in central Maine that kept police and rescue crews busy.

Maine State Trooper Billy Baker, 32, was injured about 10:50 a.m. when his cruiser was struck by a tractor-trailer on Interstate 95 in Palmyra. Four hours later, crews still were mopping up the scene and hosing diesel fuel off the road.

A vehicle also rolled over Monday afternoon on Williams Road in Newport and a snowmobile fell partly through the ice of the east branch of the Sebasticook River in Plymouth.

State police acting Sgt. Scott Stevens said Baker was stopped with his car’s blue lights flashing at the edge of the southbound passing lane on Interstate 95, where a vehicle had slid off the road. No one was injured in that incident. A wrecker had just removed a car from the median and Baker was in his cruiser when his vehicle was struck from the rear by a fully loaded tractor-trailer.

The truck was driven by Dale Hartley, 54, of Hermon, who was transporting paper products. Hartley had just passed a line of cars, said Stevens, and as the vehicles came out of a curve, he spotted the cruiser in his path. “He said he was unable to pull back into the driving lane because of the cars,” said Stevens. “He struck the rear of Trooper Baker’s cruiser.” Stevens estimated the truck was going 50 mph.

The impact pushed the 1999 cruiser over an embankment and into the median, demolishing it. Baker suffered minor facial injuries and was treated at Sebasticook Valley Hospital in Pittsfield. “He’s now at home,” said Stevens.

Hartley continued down the road about 150 yards and then also drove onto the median. He was taken by private vehicle to be checked out at the hospital’s emergency department.

Palmyra Fire Chief Don Chute called the Maine Department of Environmental Protection after more than 130 gallons of diesel fuel from the truck’s ruptured tanks spilled into the snow and onto the road. Pittsfield firefighters originally were called to the scene to help with traffic control and then were called back about 2:30 p.m. to hose off the highway.

Stevens was assisted by specialist Jim Wright, who reconstructed the crash, and Trooper Robert Giles of the state police Commercial Enforcement Division, who had the truck towed and will complete an inspection.

While police were dealing with the Palmyra crash, another incident unfolded about 10 miles north, just off the northbound lane of Interstate 95 in Plymouth.

Trooper Rodney Charette said a snowmobile owner, whose name he did not get, was trying to extricate his machine from the Sebasticook River where the back end had become submerged after the operator struck a pressure ridge. Police were called to the scene about 12:20 p.m. by a person driving by on I-95 in Plymouth who believed the accident had just happened.

Charette said the accident actually had happened hours earlier, and that the person was unhurt and just needed assistance pulling the back end of the machine from the water. The area appeared to be frozen, said Charette, but there was a little open water beneath the ridge.

Newport Police Chief James Ricker said no one was injured in the crash on Williams Road in Newport, which involved a vehicle rolling over on slush-covered roads.

Pittsfield firefighters, having returned from the I-95 scene only moments earlier, also were called to a report of a gas stove on fire on Nichols Street. They were able to extinguish the fire with no damage to the home.