Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 22, 1990 TAG: 9003222204
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By Associated Press
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Police said there were no injuries.
"It had been so warm and then it turned cold, and then we had snow night before last," state police Sgt. R.C. Byram said.
Changing weather has caused rock slides in the same area in recent years, officials said.
The slide about 11:45 p.m. Tuesday demolished a car and caused about $25,000 damage to a tractor-trailer, Trooper James DeFord said.
Charlie Wright, maintenance supervisor for the Virginia Department of Transportation, said officials hoped to have both lanes open today. The slide closed the westbound lanes from the Crozet exit to the top of the mountain.
Police were rerouting traffic to U.S. 250 until engineers from the state Department of Transportation could clear the highway and secure the slide area.
"It's still closed off and the highway department is moving the rocks. It also will have to be inspected by experts to determine if there's going to be any further danger before it is reopened," Byram said.
Some of the largest boulders were the size of small Volkswagens he said.
No damage was done to the highway, which had a steel and wire mesh fence barricade. The rocks plowed right through that.
The fence stopped a slide earlier this year, DeFord said.
On March 20, 1986, 30,000 yards of mud and rock slid 30 feet down the highway, stopping just short of the road near the site of Tuesday night's slide.
A highway department spokesman at the time said an engineer had noticed a crack on the embankment 10 days earlier and had been watching for continued deterioration. The eastbound lanes were closed for a week then and the westbound section remained closed for 25 days as workmen blasted the slide area with dynamite and stabilized the road.
by CNB