WAYNESVILLE, N.C. (AP) — A driver has died after he drove around a barricade on a hurricane-damaged North Carolina highway that became a symbol of Helene's destruction and then drove off the roadway, officials said. civil servants.
Photos of the multi-lane Interstate 40 that Helene washed away near the Tennessee state line attracted widespread attention in the days after the storm, as the region was largely cut off by numerous road closures.
Emergency responders from Tennessee and North Carolina responded Saturday evening to a report of a crash involving a vehicle off the collapsed road and along an embankment on eastbound I-40, according to a news release from the Junaluska Community Volunteer Fire Department.
Crews descended the embankment to reach the vehicle on its side about 100 feet from the road, fire officials said. Footage from the scene shows a worker trying to reach the crumpled white vehicle at the bottom of a steep, rubble-covered slope. The driver, the only occupant of the car, was freed and taken to a hospital.
The driver, identified as Patricia Mahoney, 63, of Southern Pines, North Carolina, died later that night, according to Sgt. Brandon Miller of the North Carolina State Highway Patrol, who is investigating the cause of the crash. She joined the highway around the 7-mile marker, headed west east and went off the road around the 4-mile marker where the road ends. An autopsy is planned. There are no clues as to why she went around the barricade, Miller said.
The highway has been closed since late September when floodwaters from Hurricane Helene washed away the eastbound lanes of the highway in four long lanes along the Pigeon River, but the North Carolina Department of Transportation has said it expects to reopen one lane in each direction by new highway. year.
