Truck Carrying Newsprint Catches Fire in W.Va.

March 14--Help from fellow drivers and a quick response from firefighters kept a truck carrying a load of paper from being entirely destroyed by fire Tuesday.

"Man, I was scared," said Raymond Murphy, driver of the tractortrailer carrying rolls of newsprint from Maryland to Dallas.

Murphy was traveling west on Interstate 68 when his brakes overheated and caught fire late Tuesday morning. He said several passing truck drivers stopped their rigs to help.

Tom Wingard Jr. and Howard Wilson tried to put out the blaze with extinguishers from their cabs, but could not, Wingard said.

The two men said the fire just kept popping up in different spots in the back of the truck.

Wilson said he was standing next to a brake line canister on the trailer when it exploded. He said it sounded like a stick of dynamite going off and he "ran like hell" when it happened.

Murphy said he has been driving a truck for nine years and never experienced anything like Tuesday's blaze. He was quick to praise those who stopped and the emergency responders for putting out the blaze.

"It was engulfed when we got here," West Virginia State Police Trooper 1st Class M.S. Horne said of the trailer.

The blaze was reported to MECCA 911 at about 10:45 a.m. In addition to state police, members of Morgantown Fire Department Station 1 responded and were able to extinguish the flames. The Clinton District and the Triune-Halleck volunteer fire departments assisted.

Horne said they believe the truck's brakes locked up and caught fire. From there, flames spread to the trailer and to some of the paper inside. They were able to separate the cab from the trailer to protect that part of the vehicle.

The fire shut down I-68 until about 11:30 a.m.

Copyright 2012 - The Dominion Post, Morgantown, W.Va.