CROSSVILLE CHRONICLE

Listed in stable condition at Cumberland Medical Center yesterday was Efrain Velazquez, 29, Jersey City, NJ. He was driver of a tractor-trailer rig owned by McClendon Trucking Co. A driving team of Richard Mardis, 32, and Joyce Dalton, 29, both of Sharpsburg, GA, in a tractor-trailer rig loaded with tons of bagged oranges, were treated at CMC and later released.

The accident occurred east of Crab Orchard near the 334 mile marker on I-40 in the eastbound lane around 3:30 p.m. in the rain. Details of the accident are not known, however, after the two trucks became tangled the McClendon truck slammed into a rock wall in the median while the truck loaded with oranges struck several small trees and flopped over on its side on the right side of the lane.

Reportedly Mardis was driving and Dalton was asleep in the truck's sleeper when the accident occurred. Both were easily freed from the wreckage of their overturned truck.

Rescue workers had to grapple with twisted metal of what once was the truck's cab. When firefighters first arrived on the scene, they could not see the driver inside the heap of metal. About an hour of working and cutting the hydraulic and diesel fuel-soaked debris netted freedom for the driver who was then rushed to CMC and, remarkably, found to be in good condition.

Traffic was reduced to one lane around the wreck scene and cleanup crews labored most of the night cleaning up the littered wreck site. Cumberland County Sheriff's Department deputies assisted the Tennessee Highway Patrol with traffic control and THP and the Department of Safety's Motor Vehicle Enforcement division investigated the accident.