Police in Columbia, S.C., cited Vann Keith Gibson, a mixer driver for Ready Mixed Concrete Co., after the truck he was operating plunged from an Interstate 126 bridge, fell 65 ft. and landed upright. Sustaining only minor injuries in the late-August incident, Gibson was issued citations from the Columbia Police Department for driving too fast for conditions and operating an unsafe motor vehicle (given the type of vehicle at the particular location of the accident).

The empty, front-discharge mixer truck was on the westbound bridge leaving downtown Columbia during evening rush hour at the time of the crash. Approximately 10 feet separate the parallel eastbound bridge above the Broad River. According to Skot Garrick, public information officer for the Columbia P.D., Gibson was driving in the left-most lane, lost control of the vehicle, swerved into the far-right lane, then came back into the left lane, crashing through the guardrail. Apparently, the truck struck the adjacent bridge keeping it right-side up as is fell to the rocks below and landed in the river. Despite the crowded interstate, Gibson managed not to hit any other vehicles. An unidentified second man who waded into the river to help rescue the driver was overcome by the current, but was said to be okay after a brief hospital stay. Gibson, who was wearing a seatbelt when the accident occurred, was eventually hoisted back onto the bridge by rescue workers using an emergency crane and gurney, Garrick reports. The driver was taken to the trauma center at Palmetto Health Richland hospital, where he was treated for a cut lip, bruises and aches.

Before the day was done, two construction cranes carried out the delicate task of extracting the wrecked mixer truck from the ravine. “Because the vehicle had fallen between the two bridges, pulling it out of the river proved a difficult task. It took about two hours,” says Garrick. Gibson did not comment about when he would be returning to work at the Chapin plant of Ready Mixed Concrete, where he has been working since September 2002, when it was known as Unicon Concrete. Ready Mixed acquired Unicon in December of that year.