A trio of recent incidents on Interstate 696 has raised the concern of the Michigan State Police and officials with at least two state agencies.
As reported by local media station WDIV, three motorists had their vehicles damaged and one driver suffered critical injuries from chunks of concrete that broke off from the highway and crashed through the windshields of their cars.
All three incidents occurred over a two-week period this month, and all happened along the same stretch of highway that runs through Warren.
In the first incident, a woman traveling down Hoover Road was stunned when a concrete chunk as big as a football penetrated her windshield and sent shards of glass all over her and her car. Luckily, she avoided injury and kept the chunk for a souvenir of her misadventure.
A Chesterfield man was the second victim, as “in the blink of an eye” another large block of road broke off and shattered his windshield as he cruised along I-696.
He credits the new window tinting he had just applied for saving him from facial trauma. The concrete section wound up on the dashboard.
The third victim suffered serious injuries. The driver, a 42-year-old resident of Grosse Pointe, suffered injuries to the side of her head and forehead when a block of concrete weighing as much as a dozen pounds blasted through the window of her car.
The impact knocked her unconscious, and her car collided with a Pontiac Grand Prix. That impact caused the two cars to slam into a barrier on the highway. The woman remains in St. John’s Hospital. Her condition is reported to be critical.
The MSP sent the block of concrete from the third incident to the state Department of Transportation in an attempt to stop further injuries to motorists on the highway. Meanwhile, workers from the Macomb Road Commission filled the hole with cold patch.
Situations like this can be extremely hazardous and leave victims with traumatic brain injuries and facial deformities that may require numerous surgical procedures and rehab therapies. The medical bills could easily bankrupt even a well-insured motorist, which is why it’s a good idea to consider all legal options for compensation for your injuries and damages.
Source: Detroit Metro Times, “In the last two weeks chunks of concrete have crashed through the windshields of three drivers on I-696,” Joseph Cooke, May 19, 2017
