By Susan Bromley

Staff Writer

Groveland Twp.

– Shortly before 2:30 p.m. last Saturday, a whiteout descended upon I-75 in the township. Moments later, the crashes began in the northbound lanes.

Within minutes, 37 vehicles, including four semi-trucks and a U-Haul truck, were piled up on the freeway, with emergency responders rushing to the scene a half-mile north of E. Holly Road.

“There is a corner and it goes downhill a little, and the way it was described, there was two minutes of a complete whiteout,” said Groveland Fire Chief Steve McGee. “No one knows who started it, but everyone was involved within just minutes, with vehicles on their roofs, on their sides, all of them had a lot of damage.”

Fortunately, there were no life-threatening injuries. Firefighters from Groveland were joined by those from Springfield and Independence townships as well as the North Oakland Fire Authority, Michigan State Police and Oakland County Sheriff’s Office deputies in responding to the scene after a flood of 9-1-1 calls. Crashes were simultaneously happening on the southbound lanes of I-75 as a result of the slippery condiitions.

McGee credits police with doing a great job on slowing and stopping traffic to the area, and with the scene secured, medics started triage, a sorting system in which they rushed from vehicle to vehicle, assessing occupants and tagging them with different colors according to severity of injuries while another crew disconnected batteries to vehicles to avoid fire hazards from the crash.

“The first person I came to, the car was upside down and they were belted in,” said McGee. “I asked how they were and he said fine, and unbuckled to get out.”

In all, 12 people suffered injuries and were transported to Genesys Regional Medical Center in Grand Blanc. Ambulances also transported the non-injured to two local gas stations, as well as the Groveland Fire Station where they could keep warm while waiting for family or friends to pick them up. McGee said all of those involved in the crash were off the scene in about 30 minutes. Police and fire remained on the scene for another three hours as vehicles were towed and the roadway cleaned of debris before reopening to traffic.

“It went very well and it was nice to work with neighbors,” said McGee. “We train together and it pays off. This one was very condensed. I responded to a crash involving 104 vehicles once, it stretched over a mile and was a little more challenging.”

Saturday’s pileup followed a more than 53-vehicle pileup on I-96 in Fowlerville on Dec. 8 that killed three people and injured 11. Those crashes were also attributed to a whiteout.

While acknowledging that whiteouts are a sudden event and difficult to predict, McGee reminds motorists to always leave sufficient distance between vehicles and to slow down in questionable weather.