4 Dead in Icy Highway Crashes

Several multi-car pileups—including one involving dozens of vehicles—in icy conditions on interstates in the Philadelphia area claimed at least four lives and injured dozens today as hundreds of crashes were reported across eastern Pennsylvania, authorities say. State police in Philadelphia say 31-year-old Eric Blau of Philadelphia was killed when he got out of his disabled vehicle on Interstate 76 at about 6:40am today and was hit by another vehicle. Officials say his vehicle was one of the first struck in a series of crashes that involved about 60 vehicles on the icy roadway, injuring about 30 people, and closed the highway for much of the day.

Police in neighboring Delaware County say Thomas Brennan of Lansdale and Jason Anderson of Dover, Delaware were killed when their vehicles hit a tractor-trailer that lost control due to ice in the southbound lanes of Interstate 476. Police say 15 vehicles were involved in that crash and an ensuing accident, which injured five more people, one seriously. Both interstates are busy arteries serving communities west of the city. "I've driven through snow a lot, and this isn't like anything I've ever driven in," says a driver who missed her neice's baptism due to the I-76 crash. "I was going less than 10 mph, but I had no control of my vehicle." (More car crash stories.)