In Florida, Smoke From Wildfires Causes Car Wrecks, Closes 10 Miles of Interstate
LOU WATERS, CNN ANCHOR: If you're going through Florida, smoke from wildfires has forced officials in Florida to close a 10-mile stretch of Interstate 4, which leads to Disney World, in Orlando. So if you're not headed to Disney World, you may want to avoid that area entirely. The state patrol reported several early-morning wrecks in one of them; somebody died. Joining us now is Greg Fox with our affiliate WESH with more on all of this -- Greg.</s>GREG FOX, WESH REPORTER (voice-over): Aside from the personal pain and loss, the numbers in this series of wrecks are staggering: four separate pileups -- 20 vehicles in all, including eight commercial trucks, some of them semis; at least 10 people were taken to four area hospitals, most of them with minor injuries. But the man driving this Toyota Avalon did not survive after a collision involving a red van and a truck. The smoke, fog, and early morning light combined for visibility some victims and witnesses described as driving blind.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All of a sudden, you heard -- my nephew hit him. That's when I got off the road.</s>FOX (on camera): What was it -- just like a chain reaction, everybody just hit.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, yes.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And then you could see probably about 200 feet in front of you, maybe 300, and the visibility went down to like maybe 20 feet or 30 feet in a matter of seconds.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I've got three people who need to go to the hospital, but they're not -- it could have been worse, OK?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everything was floating along smoothly, and all of a sudden, they hit a cloud of smoke, and everything started to happen after that.</s>FOX: We are out now live, just south of Walt Disney World, on the westbound lanes of Interstate 4, which have been shut down since this early morning accident, which happened just before 7:00. As you can see now, tow truck workers have been busy. They've been collecting most of the larger wreckage from the two tankers and the other six commercial vehicles that were involved in this collection of accidents that happened because of the smoky conditions, the fog and the early-morning darkness. They hope have the westbound lanes of I4, which connect Orlando to the Tampa area open sometime in the next half hour, but again, that could change. They've got some oil on the road. They've got fuel on the road. They've still got some wreckage to the road. And it could take possibly another hour. Meanwhile, traffic's all the way backed up, close to Disney World, at this point -- Lou.</s>WATERS: It doesn't, Greg, seem as smoky as is was yesterday when we were watching this. We couldn't see the hand in front of their faces.</s>FOX: Yes, the Davenport Fire is what they call this here in Polk County, of central Florida -- that's about 10 to 12 miles from here. And the wind is actually blowing in the other direction, so the interstate really isn't bad for the visibility now, but it was a different story this morning.</s>WATERS: Do you know what's going on over at Disney World? Are they having a rough time doing business over there?</s>FOX: It really doesn't seem so bad right now because they're fortunate that another fire that has been nearby them, with the wind blowing, is keeping the smoke north and east of Disney World, so again, they haven't had too many problems like they had earlier in the week.</s>WATERS: Greg, thanks for the help -- Greg Fox of WESH. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com