Pa. turnpike crash exposed gaps, officials say
Pennsylvania state senators are warning that a Valentine’s Day pileup on the Pennsylvania Turnpike was a lesson in chaos and gridlock that needs to be corrected.
Officials from the Pennsylvania State Police and the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission acknowledged during a Senate Transportation Committee hearing on Tuesday that they need to work on their response to major pileups.
Nobody died as a result of the 41-crash chain-reaction over three miles on the turnpike in suburban Philadelphia, about seven miles east of the Willow Grove interchange in Bucks County.
But officials acknowledged that some responding agencies didn’t communicate well initially, including the state police and Bensalem police. Backed up traffic hampered the efforts of police and responders because gridlocked cars couldn’t get out of the way.
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