Chicago: For hours, traffic on a busy interstate that connects Chicago to Detroit stood still, blocked by a massive pileup involving more than 46 vehicles, many of them semitrailers.
Three people died Thursday and more than 20 were injured — including one critically — in the accident on a snowy stretch of eastbound Interstate 94 in northwestern Indiana. At least one person was trapped in a vehicle for hours before authorities could come to the rescue, Indiana State Police said.
Snow and whiteout conditions were contributing factors, state police said late Thursday night. A band of heavy lake-effect snow was reported on Thursday afternoon when the pileup began, dropping 1 to 2 inches of snow per hour and reducing visibility to a quarter-mile or less, National Weather Service meteorologist Evan Bentley said.
The eastbound lanes of I-94 were to be closed overnight as cranes and wreckers helped clear the scene and investigators tried to determine the chain of events, state police said, noting the investigation could take several weeks.
