Rating:

0.0 (0 votes)

PICACHO - Another deadly day on Intersate 10 near Picacho Peak blamed on blowing dust. A 16-vechicle pileup happened just after noon on Tuesday.

A 70-year-old man died in the accident. 5 people were also taken to University Medical Center. We're told that they are in critical but stable condition. 17 others received minor injuries.

We spoke with a Mother who was on the phone with her son while the 16-vehicle pileup was still happening. He's okay. But she shared with us what that phone call was like.

"He kept saying I think I'm okay. I don't think I'm hurt," said Joy Peacock. "But you don't know. As a Mother that's a call you don't want to get. When you're talking to him on the phone and you hear the hit...it's the scariest thing in the world."

Patrick Calhoun with Avra Valley Fire was one of the 1st responders on scene. He described it like a war zone.

"You show up you can't see anything you can barely see 20 ft in front of you. You do the best you can. You rely on your training."

"I think the geographics of the area make the wind like a funnel in the area causing it to all the dust," said Carrick Cook, Public Information Officer with the Department of Public Safety. "Being in the desert dust is just everywhere. But in this particular area the winds get picked up in this part of the year and it just happens to be a really windy part of the year."

This is the 3rd major pileup on this stretch of road due to a dust storm since August making it the 2nd deadly pileup crash.

Authorities closed the interstate for most of the afternoon. They reopened the eastbound lanes around 5:45 p.m. DPS says before 8:30 p.m. officials had reopened all westbound lanes but one.