Officials speak out about chemical spill traffic accident in Aiken County
AIKEN COUNTY, S.C. (WJBF) – A little after 4:30 p.m. Tuesday afternoon, the Aiken County Sheriff's Office responded to a tractor-trailer that went over a bridge on I20 at Highway 1.
'The tractor-trailer had hazardous material that it was hauling. That hazardous material has been identified as methyl acetate, which is a highly flammable hazardous material,' said Jason Griffin, Major, Aiken County Sheriff's Office.
'Just saw the 18-wheeler leaking out like some fluid of whatnot, and on it, it says flammable,' said Bahseem Peterson, Helped the driver out of the truck. 'So, we were trying to get everybody to back up as far as possible and get the young lady out of the 18-wheeler and get her back as far as possible.'
The driver had to be cut out of the truck and was transported by EMS to MCG.
'I saw the truck go off of the overpass, so I took off running,' said Ashley Loftin, who helped the driver out of the truck. 'They had to cut her seatbelt off of her, and she was just saying, get me out of the truck, get me out of the truck. Because I think she was afraid it was going to blow up.'
On the scene are the Aiken County Sheriff's Office, South Carolina Highway Patrol, State Transport Police, Aiken County Emergency Management, Aiken County Hazmat, Center Fire Department, and Department of Transportation.
'The fire department is on scene for fire suppression. Emergency management is working with the fire department and the hazmat team to try and control the leak. There's an off-site company coming from Columbia that is bringing a group down to try and offload the hazardous material,' said Griffin.
Interstate 20 is shut down at Exit 18 and 29. Highway 1 at East Frontage Road and Fulmer Road will all be closed for an extended period of time with detours in place.
'A code red was sent out for a one-mile radius to do a shelter-in-place just to mitigate the traffic flow around the hazardous material. As well as a couple of businesses nearby, they were evacuated,' said Griffin.
These detours are expected to last around 10 to 12 hours. If the estimate holds, the roads would remain shut down until 2 a.m. Wednesday.
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