- April 28, 2024
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UPDATE: 6:50 p.m.
The Florida Highway Patrol has issued a press release identifying the name of the man who died in the predawn crash today. His name is Christopher James Mceuen, 41, of Jacksonville.
The driver of the other vehicle, St. Claire Agenord, 33, of Winter Haven, was not injured, but he was arrested on an unrelated charge. Agenord remains cooperative with the investigation into the crash, according to the FHP report.
UPDATE: 3:27 p.m.
The following notice was sent by Robert Weber, spokesman for the Flagler County Sheriff's Office:
"I just received additional information regarding the traffic situation on Flagler County roadways following this morning fatal crash on I-95 North.
"The City of Palm Coast has re-timed traffic lights along State Road 100 from the I-95 interchange to Belle Terre Parkway in order to ease traffic congestion along that stretch of roadway.
"FPH has assigned a Trooper to the intersection of East Moody Blvd (State Road 100) and US 1 to control the traffic signal at that location and keep traffic moving.
"The crash site has been cleared of the vehicles involved in the crash.
"Work crews are on scene at this time repaving the damaged roadway. They hope to have the work completed and the roadway reopened around 5:00 p.m. this evening."
Original post:
One tractor trailer hit the rear end of another sometime between 3 a.m. and 4 a.m. on Christmas Eve, at mile marker 291 on Interstate 95, and the result was a blaze so intense that the blacktop was reduced to pebbles. The northbound lanes are still closed, as of 11 a.m.
Palm Coast Fire Chief Mike Beadle arrived on the scene as the fire was shooting into the sky before dawn. He and his crew were staged a half mile away. Then he walked closer, and, in the middle of the street, he found papers with log information, indicating it was potentially a gasoline tanker. He walked closer and, incredibly, found the rest of the three-ring binder intact, a log book called a manifest, confirming that the cargo was gasoline.
“That’s an unheard of thing,” Beadle said, recalling how he found the book. “With all my years of doing this, that was a first. … There are miracles on Christmas Eve.”
Once they knew it was gasoline, the firefighters let the fire burn itself down, which is standard procedure in that kind of situation, Beadle said. Fortunately, it was not anything that was more hazardous.
As the fire died down and firefighters began to work on the scene, the body of the driver was discovered in the cab of one of the trucks. No information on his identity had been released to Beadle as of 11 a.m. There were no other reported injuries.
“Our condolences to the family,” Beadle said.
The surface of the road is another matter. “The interstate will be closed for some time,” Beadle said. The heat from the fire burned the oils in the road, “so you could rub your foot through pebbles,” he said. “It tore up the road. They have to rebuild it, and normally that takes a couple of hours, but I think finding the black top (supplies) is a problem because it’s Christmas Eve.”
He was told by the Florida Highway Patrol that it could take 24 hours to fix the surface. In the meantime, northbound travelers will need to bypass Palm Coast and catch I-95 again in St. Johns County.
The following is a 10:26 a.m. tweet from the Flagler County Sheriff's Office:
HEAVY TRAFFIC WB ON SR 100 TO US1 DUE TO TRAFFIC BEING DIVERTED FROM 95, CURRENTLY TRAFFIC IS BACKED UP AND MOVING..
A resident’s video
Steven Concia goes to bed later than most people every night. The Frontier Drive resident has an Internet-based business, which requires him to work until about 2 a.m. He went to bed around 3 a.m. and then was awoken by a loud noise.
“I’m a very light sleeper,” he said. “I was just dozing off. My house got hit by a tornado last week, so I thought, ‘Not again!’”
I saw that the sky was orange, and he had a new phone with video, so he decided to take a drive toward I-95 and see what he could see. Click the video below:
