WASHINGTON CITY – Traffic backed up for 3 miles on northbound Interstate 15 Tuesday afternoon after the tire tread blew off of an SUV, resulting in three separate collisions between six vehicles.

Shortly after 5 p.m., a woman driving a red Dodge SUV was traveling north on I-15 near milepost 12 when the tread on her left rear tire blew off, Utah Highway Patrol Sgt. Danny Ferguson said.

Collision one – red Dodge SUV versus white Ford Focus No. 1

When the tire tread blew off, Ferguson said, it scared the woman, causing her to jerk the steering wheel and swerve to the left and hit the guard rail.

“After she hit the guard rail, then she came back trying to get off of the road onto the right shoulder and she didn’t notice the little white Ford (Focus) behind her and she clipped it as she was getting off into the emergency lane,” Ferguson said.

Collision two – white Ford Focus No. 2 versus red Toyota truck

The red Dodge SUV and the white Ford Focus were able to move out of traffic into the emergency lane. However, the tire tread from the SUV was still out in the left lane of travel when another white Ford Focus came along.

“He slowed down pretty much to a stop from what I understand,” Ferguson said, “and he was abruptly rear-ended by the red Toyota truck.”

After the red Toyota truck crashed into the back of the white Ford Focus, a white Toyota truck, also traveling in the fast lane, came up behind the red Toyota truck, Ferguson said.

Collision three – white Toyota truck versus black Ford truck

The driver of the white Toyota truck was able to stop before crashing into the vehicle in front of him. However, when he stopped, he was abruptly hit by a black Ford truck that came up behind him.

The six cars collided within 100 yards of each other, Ferguson said, but not a single injury was reported as a result of the collisions.

And the citations go to

At the scene, Ferguson said citations would likely be issued to:

• the driver of the red Dodge SUV for the equipment for the tires, and the lane travel for clipping Ford Focus No.1
• the driver of the red Toyota truck for rear-ending the white Ford Focus No. 2
• the driver of the black Ford truck for rear-ending the white Toyota truck

“The third one, they weren’t stopping for the debris,” Ferguson said, “they just weren’t paying attention.”

Impacts

The red Toyota truck and the black Ford truck had to be towed from the scene.

“They got pretty decent front-end damage,” Ferguson said. “The fenders came back into the tires so they weren’t movable.”

Traffic was backed up to at least mile marker 9, Ferguson said. By 6 p.m., the 3 mile backup began to breakup and traffic was moving steadily again.

“All this was actually avoidable if she would have had better equipment and the right size tires,” Ferguson said of the Dodge SUV, “and had the other ones just been paying a little bit more attention.”

This report is based on preliminary information provided by UHP at the scene and may not contain the full scope of findings.

Click on photo to enlarge it, then use your left-right arrow keys to cycle through the gallery.

Related posts

• Driver dies from rollover on I-15; officials release identity; family comments
• SUV loses control on I-15, collides with vehicle, ricochets between barriers, rolls
• Tire blows, vehicle rolls off southbound I-15

Email: [email protected]

Twitter: @STGnews

Copyright St. George News, SaintGeorgeUtah.com LLC, 2015, all rights reserved.