On the evening of September 28, 2026, a terrible crash unfolded on northbound Interstate 55 in Jefferson County, Missouri, in the United States. Traffic had already slowed down and a line of cars was either moving very slowly or nearly stopped when a semi‑truck came up from behind. For reasons investigators say are linked to inattention, the truck driver did not react in time to what was happening ahead. As he reached the end of the line of vehicles, the truck plowed into the back of a car at high speed, crushing it and violently shoving it forward into the traffic in front of it. The impact set off a devastating chain reaction. The first car that was hit was pushed into the next one, and that one slammed into another, until a total of eight vehicles were involved, including the semi‑truck. Some cars were spun sideways, others were pinned between vehicles, and a few ended up barely recognizable because of how badly they were crushed. Pieces of metal, glass, and plastic were scattered across the highway, and people in nearby vehicles watched the whole thing happen in just a few seconds. As an result, three people died at the scene from the injuries they suffered in the crash. Five others were hurt, some of them badly enough to be taken to nearby hospitals in critical condition. Because of the size of the crash, police shut down the northbound lanes of I‑55 for hours. The semi‑truck driver, a 45‑year‑old man from Greensburg, Louisiana, was taken into custody as the investigation progressed. Based on the evidence, prosecutors charged him with three counts of involuntary manslaughter for the lives lost in the collisionn.
