Tanker Explosion

Michele and I had just left the house to get some mulch for some landscaping work in our yard when we noticed some thick black smoke coming from South of town. It reminded me of a previous instance in which I was able to photograph a rather spectacular fire,so I had Michele turn the car around so that we could get my camera. When we headed out once again we noticed the smoke had lessened quite a bit, but decided to still head in that direction to see what was going on. I snapped the following picture out of the passenger window as we headed South on Towanda Avenue.

 

As we continued South we noticed the smoke dissipating and assumed the fire was being extinguished, but still curious we continued out of Bloomington and towards the town of Downs. What we found was traffic being diverted off of the interstate, so we turned the radio on to see what was going on. By now the smoke was gone, and we learned that a tanker truck had exploded on Interstate 74 about half a mile from the Downs exit. Here is a photo taken by a Pantagraph photographer.

 

We were saddened to learn that the tanker driver did not survive the crash. Our thoughts go out to this man, and his family.