Two people were injured in a Virginia tractor-trailer accident on Monday, April 15, 2013. Virginia State Police charged the truck driver with multiple crimes, including reckless driving and drug possession. The VA commercial truck accident is still under investigation.
According to local Virginia news sources, the big-rig crash took place near Wytheville on Interstate 81. A tractor-trailer loaded with 50,000 pounds of strawberries was driving on the northbound lanes of I-81 when the driver lost control of the vehicle, ran off of the left side of the road, and drove across the median into oncoming southbound traffic. The 18-wheeler truck then collided with a pickup truck traveling south, with the larger vehicle overturning onto the smaller vehicle.
Both the driver of the commercial truck and the driver of the pickup truck were injured in the crash.
The driver of the strawberry truck, 40-year-old Jamie Richardson of North Carolina, faces numerous charges in the wake of the accident. A statement released by the Virginia State Police said that the trucker was charged with reckless driving, not wearing a seat belt, possession of a controlled substance, possession of marijuana, possession of synthetic cannabinoids, and possession of drug paraphernalia. Currently, it is unclear whether the truck driver had been using illegal drugs at the truck of the accident, though many truckers are tested for drug use at the time of a traffic accident that involves injury.
The Virginia truck accident attorneys at Shapiro, Washburn & Sharphope that both drivers recover fully and quickly from their traffic accident injuries and that the cause of the crash is pinpointed soon.