OCEAN CITY – Four
individuals were hospitalized after an accident on the Harry Kelley Memorial
Bridge last Thursday evening that wiped out a large section of fence and closed
the bridge in both directions during a peak summer evening.
Around 8:15 p.m. last
Thursday, Ocean City police responded to a reported single-vehicle accident
with injuries on the Route 50 bridge. The investigation revealed the driver of
a Ford F-250 truck heading westbound on the bridge had lost control of the
vehicle and crashed into the pedestrian fence on the north side of the bridge
just west of the drawbridge portion of the span.
Two adults and two
juveniles occupied the truck at the time of the crash and all four were transported
to Atlantic General Hospital in Berlin with undisclosed injuries. All of the
eastbound and westbound lanes were closed down for an extended period of time
to facilitate the response of police, fire and emergency services crews,
creating massive back-ups in both directions at either end of the bridge during
a peak travel time at the height of the summer season.
Officers on scene were
able to establish a traffic pattern consisting of one lane open in either
direction, one eastbound and one westbound, as clean-up crews tended to the
debris in the roadway. The crash is still under investigation.