An 18-wheeler crashed and caught fire on Interstate 69 near Main Street early Tuesday, shutting down the northbound side of the Southwest Freeway near Midtown for hours and snarling the morning commute into downtown Houston.
The crash, which involved an 18-wheeler that caught fire, was confirmed by the Houston Police Department, according to the Houston Chronicle. Houston TranStar verified the incident at 2:36 a.m., and Houston police responded to the fire about three minutes later, per the same account. Preliminary information from police indicated that cars pulled over to help at the scene.
By 6:10 a.m., all main lanes on the freeway had been closed for more than three hours, the Chronicle's report notes. Traffic did not begin moving again until 6:24 a.m., when it started flowing along the left side of the freeway, according to the same TranStar-sourced update.
What Remains Unknown
The cause of the fire was not clear as of the report, and it also remained unclear whether anyone was injured in the crash, the newspaper's reporting states. Those details had not been resolved as of Tuesday morning.
A separate KHOU report similarly described an 18-wheeler engulfed in flames shutting down the northbound Southwest Freeway near Main Street ahead of Houston's Tuesday morning commute, corroborating the scale of the disruption commuters faced heading into the city.
A Familiar Stretch of Freeway
This is not the first time a burning 18-wheeler has snarled traffic on this same stretch of the Southwest Freeway near Main Street. A KHOU report from earlier this year described a concrete-truck crash that similarly left an 18-wheeler engulfed in flames and shut down the northbound freeway ahead of the morning commute, though that incident involved only minor injuries according to that report.
Drivers making their way into Midtown and downtown Houston on Tuesday were left navigating around the closure during peak commute hours, with the left side of the freeway serving as the only route through until crews could fully clear the scene.
