Update: Five crashes snarl traffic on I-94 in Fargo

FARGO (KVRR-KFGO) – Troopers with the North Dakota Highway Patrol were busy during rush hour Tuesday morning, responding to five crashes over the course of about an hour on a four-mile stretch of east and westbound I-94.

First responders were called to the scene of a rollover crash in the eastbound lanes of Interstate 94 just west of the I-29 tri-level at 7:40 a.m. Paul Hilt, a witness who called 911, says three vehicles were involved. Hilt was part of a crew working on a nearby billboard.

While the investigation into that crash was going on, State Patrol Captain Bryan Niewind said heavy eastbound traffic began to back up and an additional crash happened at the eastbound I-94 to I-29 offramp involving multiple vehicles. He said there were some minor injuries involved in that crash.

As troopers were responding to those first two crashes, an additional three crashes occurred on westbound I-94 between University Drive and the construction zone by 25th Street.

“Those were all property damage crashes,” Niewind said. “So in a very short period of time we had five different crashes that were going on here. It’s that time of morning – there’s a lot of heavy traffic, people are merging and they’re diverging. It does slow around some of those areas where traffic is getting on and off of the interstate and a lot of times it’s just people driving too fast coming into some of those areas.”

One of the crashes westbound on I-94 was in the construction zone where a temporary lane re-direction is set up. Niewind said one vehicle sideswiped another when it didn’t follow the lane re-direction.

All five crashes were cleared before 9:00 a.m.