Police responded to an unusual incident on Monday after four cows fell from a trailer being towed by a pickup truck on the Maine Turnpike.
Maine State Police said they responded to a single-vehicle crash involving a pickup truck hauling a cattle trailer on the Maine Turnpike in Lewiston at 11:30 a.m. on Monday. The driver was going south when the incident occurred.
The initial investigation indicates that the rear doors of the cattle hauler were not properly secured, causing them to unlatch. As a result, the cows inside the trailer shifted, leading to three of them falling from the back of the trailer onto the highway and one cow running out of the vehicle once the trailer had stopped.
One cow landed in the passing lane and suffered a broken leg, while two others sustained road rash and were located on the shoulder of the highway. The fourth cow ran out of the trailer and into the woods nearby. Troopers secured one of the cows by tying it to the back of his cruiser.
Traffic was impacted, with one lane temporarily shut down as the driver, 39-year-old Dustin Bubar, of Stetson, worked to reload the animals into the trailer. State police said Bubar was cited for unsecured load on a vehicle.
Animal control officers from the Lewiston Police Department assisted at the scene, along with several passersby who stopped to help.
Police said two of the injured cows will have to be euthanized due to the severity of their injuries.
The crash remains under investigation.
