Five killed in anhydrous ammonia truck incident

A multi-vehicle accident sparked a spillage of anhydrous ammonia on Friday when a truck carrying the substance overturned. Acccording to the County Coroner "five people were fatally overcome by anhydrous ammonia, including two children under 12 and an adult from the same Teutopolis residence. A semi truck driver from Ohio and a motorist from Missouri were also killed, while five others were airlifted to hospitals, including the driver of the truck carrying the toxic material."

The NTSB is investigating and emergency responders remained on site during Saturday to work on containing the cloud of anhydrous ammonia. Effingham County Sheriff Paul Kuhns said in a press conference  “a large plume, cloud of anhydrous ammonia on the roadway that caused terribly dangerous air conditions in the northeast area of Teutopolis,” Mr Kuhns said. “Because of these conditions, the emergency responders had to wait. They had to mitigate the conditions before they could really get to work on it, and it was a fairly large area.”