THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, March 5, 1996 TAG: 9603050222
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LARRY W. BROWN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 64 lines
The interstate highways of South Hampton Roads turned into a giant parking lot Monday morning as a series of traffic accidents - including three near Willoughby - stalled commuters and sent at least seven people to hospitals.
No deaths or serious injuries were reported.
Details of what caused the accidents were sketchy late Monday, but state police spokeswoman Tammy Van Dame said most were caused by drivers traveling too closely together.
In all, there were three chain-reaction accidents within minutes, involving nine cars on westbound I-64 at the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel near Willoughby Spit.
The first occurred at 6:46 a.m. involving a Hampton woman and her daughter, who were taken to DePaul Medical Center for minor injuries. Van Dame said she did not know what caused that two-car wreck.
Driver inattention and following too close led to the second two-car wreck. Then a five-car pile-up occurred near the same spot, Van Dame said.
Joseph H. Koziol of Virginia Beach, the driver of the fourth vehicle in the five-car collision, was traveling about 50 mph when his car collided with an Isuzu Trooper, Van Dame said. Koziol was trapped inside his 1994 Honda for about 20 minutes before rescuers could free him and take him to Sentara Norfolk General Hospital to be treated for facial injuries.
There were no reported injuries inside the Trooper, though the rear of the vehicle came to rest on the bridge-tunnel's guardrail.
Koziol was charged with following too closely along with two other drivers in the five-car accident. There was one following-too-closely charge issued on the second two-car wreck, Van Dame said; that driver's name was not available.
That accident shut down westbound traffic for nearly 1 1/2 hours and backed up drivers as far as Tidewater Drive, Van Dame said.
``By 7:30 the entire interstate system in Hampton Roads was pretty much a parking lot on the Southside,'' Van Dame said. She said several wrecks contributed to that.
The other accidents included: two on I-64 West, one near Military Highway and one near the I-564 interchange and two other collisions on I-564 near the Norfolk Naval Base.
There were four reported accidents on I-264 in Norfolk: one eastbound near Berkley Avenue, one just west of Broad Creek and two westbound near Ballentine Boulevard.
There were no serious injuries in these collisions, she said.
Van Dame said with the volume of rush-hour traffic, combined with the number of motorist not paying attention, Monday's accidents had the potential to be a lot worse.
``We were lucky,'' Van Dame said, ``this time.'' ILLUSTRATION: JIM WALKER
The Virginian-Pilot
A multi-vehicle collision on the westbound lanes of the Willoughby
Bridge tied up morning traffic on Interstate 64.
KEYWORDS: ACCIDENT TRAFFIC INJURIES by CNB