A Barnhart man was injured Tuesday afternoon (May 22) in a commercial truck accident that spilled fertilizer along Hwy. NN about one-fourth mile south of Hummingbird Lane in Catawissa, authorities reported.
At 1:50 p.m., Jon C. Blansett, 31, of Barnhart was driving a 2006 Isuzu fertilizer truck north on Hwy. NN, and the truck ran partly off the right side of the road before he overcorrected, and then the truck went off the left side of the road, struck an embankment and overturned, according to the report.
Blansett was moderately injured and transported by Big River Ambulance to St. Anthony’s Medical Center in south St. Louis County, where he was listed in good condition on Friday (May 25), a hospital spokesman said.
He was wearing a seat belt, the patrol reported.
The truck was totaled, the report said.
The Cedar Hill Fire Protection District got a call at 1:51 p.m. about the accident, and when crews arrived a short time later, they found the truck leaking fertilizer, and it was spilling onto the highway and into a nearby ditch.
Crews worked quickly to contain the spill, Assistant Chief Greg Shuster said.
“Crews dammed the ditch to keep the chemicals out of a nearby creek,” he said.
After firefighters used shovels to pack dirt in the ditch to dam the flow of fertilizer, crews arrived with large “cleanup pads” to soak up the fertilizer, Shuster said.
He said the truck was carrying 300 gallons of liquid fertilizer when it began its run that morning, but he was not sure how much was in the truck when it lost its load along Hwy. NN.