A furious blast of winter weather caused a monstrous pileup this afternoon on I-70 near Loveland Ski Area.
Clear Creek County Sheriff estimates more than 75 vehicles slammed into each other just before 3 p.m., including semi-trucks, passenger vehicles and pickup trucks towing trailers.
Local authorities confirm 19 people are injured, sending eight of them to the hospital with a range of injuries. One person is seriously injured.
CDOT is more cautious in its assessment, writing a “severe multi-car pileup” has closed the road without estimating how many vehicles are involved.
Photos from the scene show so many vehicles packed so tightly together, emergency responders can hardly walk through them. In one image, a figure is seen standing on top of the smashed vehicles with an emergency medical device in the foreground.
As of 4:30 p.m., I-70 EB is closed at Exit 205 in Silverthorne. CDOT traffic cameras show multiple tow trucks lining up behind the pileup, waiting to enter.
CDOT warns the interstate could be closed for hours, writing in a release, “Motorists traveling eastbound are being rerouted over Loveland Pass (U.S. Highway 6) to rejoin I-70 eastbound. However, due to the severity of the crash, drivers approaching the tunnels should expect to be turned around for the next several hours.”
Winter returns
The storm arrived just after dawn with heavy snow at Vail Pass and Copper Mountain. Around 8 a.m. a first accident closed westbound I-70 between the Vail Pass summit and town of Vail. That accident was cleared in less than an hour.
Throughout the day, rolling pockets of nasty weather blanketed Summit County for several minutes at a time, before the clouds would part and the sun peeked through. Depending on where you were in the county it was a whiteout or sunny – at the same time.
For perspective, here is the difference between 9,000 feet in Silverthorne and 11,100 feet near Loveland around the time of the pileup:
Today’s snowstorm is the heaviest snowfall in more than a month for Summit and nearby ski areas, bringing nearly 10 inches to Loveland.
On ground level snow totals are lighter than at the ski resorts with no more than 2 inches in Dillon.
Images courtesy CDOT and Clear Creek County Sheriff’s Office on FB.