SAND AND GRAVEL SPILL CAUSES COLLISIONS TRUCK LOSES LOAD ON 14 FREEWAY.

Byline: PATRICIA FARRELL AIDEM Staff Writer

AGUA DULCE -- A truck loaded with sand and gravel lost much its load Monday across the southbound Antelope Valley Freeway, sending several vehicles sliding into one another.

The Highway Patrol reported a 100-yard spill about 10:30 a.m. across all lanes near Escondido Canyon Road in Agua Dulce. Six cars collided.

There were no serious injuries, but motorists said they came around a blind downhill curve into the spill, their visibility blurred as high winds whipped up sand from the road.

``I was coming down the freeway and I did a 360 and hit another car,'' said Davida McCrary of Palmdale, one of 11 motorists who crashed in the mess.

CHP Officer Gordon Verrone said the sand and gravel created a ``rather large dust cloud'' that proved more hazardous than the spill itself.

``There were five separate accidents with a total of 11 vehicles involved,'' Verrone said.

The trucker carrying the aggregate never stopped, Verrone said. The gravel was on the road some 20 minutes before the first of the accidents, he added.

The cleanup took about 20 minutes as traffic backed up toward the Antelope Valley.

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2 photos

Photo:

(1 -- ran in AV edition only) Caltrans workers clean up the road where motorists on the southbound Antelope Valley Freeway, south of Escondido Canyon Road, had to deal with a spilled load of gravel and sand. The spill caused five separate accidents.

(2) The California Highway Patrol reported a 100-yard gravel spill on the southbound Antelope Valley Freeway on Monday. Eleven vehicles crashed on the freeway.

John McCoy/Staff Photographer