A 35-car pileup on snowy Interstate 93 in New Hampshire on Friday morning left a tractor-trailer in flames, crumpled cars strewn along the roadway and 12 people injured, as snow squalls and ice made driving treacherous.
The crash was reported around 10 a.m. on I-93 North in Ashland, according to the New Hampshire Department of Transportation. New Hampshire State Police Lt. Jerome Maslan said 35 vehicles were involved in two separate pileups, after initial reports that 50 to 100 cars might have been involved.
One of the crashes involved a tractor-trailer that caught fire after a vehicle went underneath it. Aerial footage of the crashes showed boxes strewn about and crumpled cars.
Kristyn Reed was driving the BMW that was next to that crash.
"[We] came out of this fog of snow, and it was right there, so we just slammed right into it and then people started hitting us," said Reed. "We had to climb over other cars to get away, because people kept saying, 'That car's going to blow.'"
"I didn't know what to do, and I was really scared," said passenger Kaylin McGlynn.
State police said there were reports of multiple injuries, but had no information on the extent.
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Speare Memorial Hospital in Plymouth said it treated nine patients from the crash, but wouldn't comment on the extent of their injuries. Two patients are still at the hospital, and one was transported to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Hanover. The other six were treated and released.
I-93 reopened shortly after 1 p.m. after being closed north of Exit 24 for nearly three hours, with traffic detoured off Exit 22.
Police say none of the injuries were life-threatening.
Snow squalls and icy roads were reported in that area of New Hampshire on Friday morning, and authorities said they contributed to the pileup.
Other snow-related crashes involving a similar number of vehicles have been reported on I-93 in New Hampshire in recent years.
In 2009, a dozen people were injured in a 59-vehicle pileup on I-93 in Derry. And in 2012, five people were injured in a 20-vehicle chain-reaction crash on I-93 in New Hampton.
