Traffic came to a standstill on the Gowanus Expressway at the BQE in Brooklyn this morning after a cascade of wooden panels spilled onto the roadway, obstructing all lanes and choking travel back to the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge. CBS News New York footage captured from Chopper 2 showed crews laboring to clear the debris, yet no vehicles were advancing.

The mayhem began near Hamilton Avenue on the northbound side, where the Gowanus merges with the BQE, directing all traffic towards a detour. Delays stretched extensively, grappling with congestion leading back to the Belt Parkway, compounded further by separate incidents on the Garden State Parkway and West Side Highway. FOX 5 NY reported that as of 8:30 a.m., all inbound lanes were shuttered, as the lumber lay strewn across the asphalt.

While the cause of the spill remained uncertain, drivers were rerouted via Hicks Street and Atlantic Avenue to re-enter the BQE. Drivers faced more trouble this morning with accidents on the Belt Parkway westbound near Lefferts Boulevard and eastbound on Merrick Boulevard, causing delays throughout the boroughs.

To the west, in New Jersey, a crash on the shoulder of the Garden State Parkway northbound, approaching Exit 148, elicited a domino effect, causing backlogs to Route 280. Back in New York, a stall on the West Side Highway around 150th Street handcuffed traffic, stretching delays back to the George Washington Bridge. Through these stretches of immobility and rerouting, drivers were advised to add a buffer to their commute times or to pivot to alternate pathways. For live updates, a traffic map from NJ511 was made available to aid in navigation.