RFP Staff
♦ A dispatch went out at around 7 a.m. reporting an 18 wheel chemical tanker overturned on the 11000 block of Bringle Ferry Road near Panther Point Road in Rowan County, N.C. The tanker, owned by “EcoSystems” of Franklin, Tennessee, carried 8 thousand gallons of highly flammable ethanol (denatured alcohol) used as fuel and is well known for turning highways into roaring infernos. Sometimes ethanol tankers explode.
The contents of tanker leaked onto the ground around it. Declared a HAZMAT LEVEL 3 EMERGENCY at first–that emergency has since been lifted when the spill was contained. Several nearby houses were evacuated.
The driver trapped inside the truck cab was freed by emergency responders and shortly thereafter pronounced dead at the scene. The deceased driver was identified as James Secher, 62, of Mooresville,
The chemical tanker is a wreck and laying on its side on an embankment. Firefighters hosed the tanker down with foam as a precaution against potential fire.
A Hazmat team from the Charlotte Fire Department is cleaning up the spill. Others have since joined the effort.
Apparently the driver lost control of the tanker on an embankment and it tipped over on its side.
Traffic was tied up for a time in the area and is now moving.
Fire engines and other emergency responders, who arrived quickly, were lined up along the road.
**The article will be updated as more information arrives.**
