Dump Truck

Three men were injured yesterday afternoon in a four-vehicle accident on the Walt Whitman Bridge that closed the westbound lanes for about 90 minutes. Carlton Read, assistant manager of public information for the Delaware River Port Authority, said the accident happened at 12:24 p.m. when a flatbed trailer hauling lumber crashed into the rear of a dump truck that had stopped on the bridge. The collision caused the dump truck to hit the back of a tour bus, which then struck the back of a tractor-trailer.

Two motorists died in a three-vehicle accident that involved a van, a tractor-trailer, and a dump truck yesterday afternoon at the intersection of Garton Road and Landis Avenue, state police said. Firman Lawless, 60, of Millville was traveling north in a van on Garton Road when he disregarded the stop sign at Landis Avenue, police said. He died instantly when his van was struck by an eastbound tractor-trailer. Upon impact, the tractor-trailer jackknifed and was struck by a dump truck heading west on Landis Avenue, according to police.

Two dozen steel bars that became unfastened from a dump truck broke eight passenger windows of an Upper Moreland School District bus Tuesday afternoon, causing glass shards to cut six Upper Moreland High School students, police said. Police said the driver of the dump truck, Steven Bauman, 30, of Lindenwold, N.J., failed to secure the load of 25 steel bars on the dump truck, and the bars came loose as he was traveling south on Davisville Road, about a half- mile north of Terwood Road about 2:45 p.m. Police issued a citation to Bauman for failing to secure the steel bars.

An Asbury Park, N.J., woman was killed yesterday in a three-vehicle accident that tied up traffic for more than two hours on U.S. Route 1 in Bensalem, Bucks County. Jane H. Gould, 49, died instantly when a dump truck rammed into and over her 1989 Nissan Stanza on Route 1 near Old Lincoln Highway, police said. They said Gould was traveling north on the highway about 4:30 p.m. when a tractor-trailer in front of her slowed to turn into a gas station. For an unknown reason, police said, the dump truck driver did not stop, plowing into and over Gould's vehicle.

Authorities identified a truck driver who was critically injured Monday morning when his trailer flipped over on I-295 in Cherry Hill as 42-year-old Dwain Gable of Lehighton, Pa. Firefighters had to extricate Gable from the cab of the northbound tractor-trailer dump truck, which toppled into the southbound lanes around 9:30 as snow fell, New Jersey state police said. Gable was taken to Cooper University Hospital, where he was listed in critical condition. State Police Sgt. Adam Grossman said the rig was near the exit for Route 70 when it fell over.

Two people were killed and two others were seriously injured when the pickup truck in which they were riding crashed into the rear of a stopped dump truck during heavy fog early yesterday in Cinnaminson. Pronounced dead of multiple injuries at the scene were Harold B. Samuels, 28, of Jones Avenue, Burlington City, and Philip Stroman, 26, of the first block of Holton Lane, Willingboro. Police said both were passengers in the cab of the pickup truck, which was northbound on Route 130 near Andover Road.

A crash involving an empty school bus and a dump truck in Plymouth Township, Montgomery County, seriously hurt both drivers yesterday. The accident occurred about 4 p.m. at Sandy Hill and Belvoir Roads. Both were flown to the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center. The truck driver, a 38-year-old man, was in critical condition, and the bus driver, a 24-year-old woman, was satisfactory, officials said.

A three-vehicle accident in Chestnut Hill yesterday afternoon left a 19- year-old West Oak Lane man dead and his 18-year-old passenger in guarded condition at Albert Einstein Medical Center, police said. Michael Perkins, 19, was driving north on Stenton Avenue when he swerved to avoid hitting a jeep traveling west on Gordon Road and crashed head-on into a dump truck, according to the police Accident Investigation Division. The impact of the 1:30 p.m. collision boomeranged Perkins' black Mercury into the jeep.

A woman was killed after a dump truck carrying sand flipped over and landed on the SUV she was driving in Cherry Hill shortly before noon Thursday, police said. The woman, whose identity was withheld pending notification of family, died at the scene of the accident at Haddonfield-Berlin Road and Morris Drive, said Lt. Bill Kushina, a township police spokesman. Two Good Samaritans stopped and frantically shoveled sand off the vehicle, a Lexus RX 350 with New Jersey license plates, according to two doctor's office employees who witnessed the aftermath.