It was a bit of messy afternoon drive on westbound I-90 between North Bend and Snoqualmie yesterday, October 15, 2013.
And of course, it happened right as school buses were trying to get students home to Snoqualmie Ridge from Twin Falls Middle School. The Snoqualmie Valley School District uses I-90 to transport most Snoqualmie Ridge middle school students the approximate 11 mile trip to and from school each day.
The multi-vehicle collision occurred between exits 25 and 27 around 2PM and had traffic at a standstill. One witness who drove by right after the collision happened said two semi-trucks and two smaller cars were involved.
The apparent chain reaction accident occurred in the right lane, which is a merging lane for exit 27 and also an exit only lane for exit 25 to SR 18. It created extra chaos for those attempting to enter and exit westbound I-90. At least one SVSD school bus was caught in the backup trying to reach exit 25 and drop student on Snoqualmie Ridge.
As I witnessed the accident scene, there did not appear to be any serious injuries. Washington State Patrol and tow trucks were on the scene, attempting to move the large semis and smaller damaged vehicles.
Some Snoqualmie parents reported their kids were about 15 minutes late getting home from school. No word yet on whether later bus routes were also delayed due to the afternoon traffic backup.
Comments
That stretch of road coupled with how Exit 27 is put together needs to be re-engineered. It’s a game of chicken, dodging big rigs to merge over to exit. We’ve had some head-on collisions with folks entering that way as well. Not to mention there is no westbound entrance to I-90, which means confusion and backups as folks round exit 25 (or Baja up the embankment as tire marks would indicate happens *CRINGE*)
It’s only a matter of time until that back up causes a fatality. It was a terribly designed exit before they re-designed it and made it worse. Two full exit lanes would help immensely at Exit 25 by allowing cars planning to go west on 18 an exit lane of their own. The right lane remain exit only and the left exit lane optional to exit or continue on 90. Whenever there is a backup it is mostly trucks in the right lane and nothing in the left. Give the cars that want to go left an exit to that lane from 90 and remove them from the backup and ease the backup some.