Video captures violent crash in Tooele County involving UHP SUV, semis and car
Mar 23, 2022, 10:54 PM | Updated: Jun 18, 2022, 8:52 pm
GRANTSVILLE, Utah — Newly-released body camera and dash camera footage gave a closer look Wednesday at a violent crash on Interstate 80 earlier this month.
On March 2, investigators said a semi-truck approached a Utah Highway Patrol SUV and a semi-truck that were pulled over to the right side of the road near Grantsville.
When the oncoming semi attempted to move over to the left lane to give space to the trooper, investigators said, the semi struck a vehicle in its blind spot and then corrected back into the trooper’s vehicle and the semi on the side of the interstate.
“I heard the sound of the screeching tires,” said UHP trooper Sterling Saiz. “I grabbed the railing on the inside of the tractor and kind of braced myself on the dashboard and the entire tractor just started shaking.”
The aftermath was awful and stunning.
“All of a sudden I just see this flaming wreckage go past the driver’s side window,” Saiz said. “There are just flames and debris, just a lot of chaos going on right there.”
Body camera footage captured a smoke plume rising from the other semi and the semi’s haul of eggs strewn across the lanes of the interstate.
Saiz could be seen in the video grabbing his fire extinguisher out of his wrecked SUV and checking on the occupants of the car the semi hit. Initial reports said they were transported to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
“Those were the most adrenalin-filled moments of the entire incident,” Saiz acknowledged.
Three injured in multi-vehicle crash; westbound I-80 closed near Grantsville
Though the crash began when investigators said the semi moved over to avoid the other vehicles along the side of the road, Saiz maintained the importance of obeying the move-over law when safe and practical.
He said, however, had he been shielded by a smaller vehicle than a semi when the impact happened, the consequences for everyone could have been far more grave.
“The fact is all of us probably would have been severely injured if not killed,” Saiz said. “This situation could have been so much worse.”
