Forty People to ER after Ice-Related Accidents
The salt truck landed near a car that was off the road already. mbl.is/Árni Sæberg
About 40 people visited the emergency room of Landspítali National University Hospital yesterday, due to accidents on icy roads and sidewalks. Many fell on sidewalks, while others had traffic accidents. Most of them arrived during the morning hours. There were broken bones, bruises and wounds. Extra medical staff had to be called out to attend to the injured, mbl.is reports.
According to Jón Magnús Kristjánsson, senior physician at the ER, this was an unusually high number of accidents. “It is unusual for this many people to arrive in a day, but this is what can happen the first day roads get icy in winter.”
Very likely, the high accident rate is caused by people not being prepared for these road conditions. Black ice – a thin, transparent coating of ice that’s hard to detect, was to blame for some of the accidents.
Roads were extremely icy in the capital area yesterday. On the so-called Flóttamannaleið route, between Garðabær and Hafnarfjörður, a salt truck rolled over and came close to landing on a car already off the road, upside down. Luckily, no one was injured in the accident.
Another vehicle rolled over on Dalvegur in Kópavogur. The driver escaped injury.
