I-35 in Liberty reopens after crews upright overturned semi, clean up potato spill
The southbound lanes of Interstate 35 in Liberty have reopened after a tractor-trailer overturned in a crash and potatoes spilled out of another truck as traffic backed up, according to a spokesman with the Missouri State Highway Patrol.
The interstate shut down shortly after 9:30 a.m. when the semi crashed and overturned, said Cpl. Justin Ewing with the highway patrol’s Troop A said.
The crash was cleared by 1:30 p.m., the Missouri Department of Transportation’s Kansas City District said on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“The spuds and overturned semi have been removed,” the Clay County Sheriff’s Office later said in a follow-up tweet.
The highway was closed when the driver of a semi hauling a load of snack food was headed south on I-35 and ran off the side of the road. The truck struck a concrete barrier and then overturned onto the highway, Ewing said.
Ewing said the crash caused the highway to shut down and traffic to begin backing up.
After the crash, a driver of another tractor-trailer slammed on the brakes because traffic was backing up, causing the potatoes the truck was hauling to shift and spill onto the highway, Ewing said.
The spill “was just something that occurred because of the traffic backup,” Ewing said.
Some of the potatoes were mashed, said Capt. Nathan Mulch with the Liberty Police Department.
The truck hauling the potatoes had cleared from the area before noon.
Meanwhile, crews worked to upright the truck that crashed and remove it. Ewing said the overturned truck didn’t lose any of its load.
While crews worked to clear the crash, the MoDOT urged drivers to find an alternate route. According to a map in a MoDOT tweet, the crash occurred in northern Liberty.
At the time, traffic was reported to be slow-moving and bumper-to-bumper along southbound I-35 south of Kearney, according to Waze, a traffic and navigation app.
This story was originally published May 30, 2024 at 11:29 AM.
