Eastbound lanes of I-70 over Vail Pass in Colorado were closed for part of Tuesday for semi wreckage recovery
The Colorado Department of Transportation closed all eastbound lanes of Vail Pass on Tuesday morning to allow crews to recover the wreckage of a semi that crashed last week. All lanes were closed at 9 a.m. with the expectation they would remain closed until at least 3 p.m. By 5 p.m. the interstate was back open.
The crash on Jan. 8 involved two semi-trucks and a lot of spilled diesel fuel, preventing crews from removing the wreckage.
CDOT crews worked on Tuesday to remove what's left of that crash. Crews trying to recover the eastbound truck accidently split open the box truck and spilled the contents inside, so that had to be collected and accounted for before they could move on to remove the truck itself. Still the recovery did not take the full 6 hours as expected.
"The semi over the edge...we are not going to mess with today," Joe Bajza, LTC Opps with CDOT said. "That is going to be a lengthy recovery on that one, so a lot of planning is going to go into getting that one unloaded and back on the road."
Bajza believes if things go right and there are no delays with the weather, they might be able to get the other semi wrenched free this week as well, although it will be a longer process. He believes that would be able to be done with a single lane closure.
Eastbound lanes of Interstate 70 at East Vail- Exit 180 were closed. A detour was in place that rerouted drivers off I-70 at East Vail, east on U.S. 24 to Leadville, then Colorado Highway 91 north to get back on I-70 at Copper Mountain.
CDOT said it was expected that drivers would have to add about 90 minutes to their travel time if in the area.