Arlington firefighters are on the scene of a car fire on westbound I-66 near Westmoreland Street.
The fire appears to have been extinguished. One lane of traffic is currently getting by.
I-66
“I just came home to find the crows are pecking at what looks like a decapitated deer head in my backyard,” the woman said in an email to the Waycroft-Woodlawn email listserv. “I don’t know what I am supposed to do… I REALLY don’t want to pick it up… it may have some disease. I have never seen a deer in our neighbourhood before. And where is the rest of the poor thing?”
The woman ended up reporting it to animal control officers with the Animal Welfare League of Arlington. An officer quickly arrived and indeed found part of a deer’s head lying in the grass.
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Drivers have been stuck on the George Washington Parkway for 5-6 hours now, according to various reports from Twitter.
The fact that there are no traffic cameras along the parkway has made it difficult to see exactly what’s going on, but Twitter users are reporting that downed trees are blocking all northbound and southbound lanes.
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Highways leading out of the District of Columbia are thick with traffic as a steady rain starts to change over to a slippery mix of sleet and snow.
Southbound I-395 and westbound I-66 are both jammed.
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We’ve heard reports of at least six crashes caused by the van between the Roosevelt Bridge and Sycamore Street on I-66. At least two additional crashes have been reported outside of Arlington. We’re hearing that two drivers required medical treatment.
Police temporarily shut down the ramp from westbound I-66 to Sycamore Street to allow an ambulance to access one of the crash sites.
I-66 is currently slow in both directions in the area of Glebe Road, near Ballston.
Traffic heading eastbound is facing delays due to some sort of road work that shut down one lane near Spout Run. That lane closure just cleared.
Commuters have wet, leaf-slicked roads to deal with this morning, but largely the drive on the highways isn’t much worse than on any other given weekday.
Traffic on I-66 is moving smoothly. I-395 is backed up, per usual, and is moving slowly approaching the 14th Street Bridge.
While noting the praise heaped on Arlington for being a model of smart growth, WTOP reporter Adam Tuss says that the county’s resistance to highway transportation projects has opened it up for criticism.
“There are others that scoff at the county, saying its officials take a parochial transportation view and only think about Arlington at the expense of the entire D.C. region,” Tuss reports.
I-66 Ignored by Google Maps — If you recently tried to get directions to points west with Google Maps, and you were surprised when the directions included a long stretch on stop-light-heavy Route 50 instead of I-66, now there’s an explanation. The inside-the-Beltway portion of the highway, which is HOV-only at certain parts of the day, is no longer an option for Google Maps users. More from WTOP.
Wardian Profiled by New York Times — Prolific Arlington marathoner Michael Wardian is not running in the upcoming New York City Marathon. In fact, he hasn’t run the race in 12 years. But he was just profiled in the New York Times’ New York City Marathon blog.
More on Southwest at Reagan National — Southwest Airlines’ deal to acquire AirTran Airways will likely result in Southwest taking over AirTran’s slots at Reagan National Airport. But Greater Greater Washington’s Rob Pitingolo argues that the long-awaited arrival of Southwest at DCA — should the deal go through — won’t have much of effect on fare prices, as some might hope.
Arlington’s Highways Clogged During Evening Commute — Dr. Gridlock reports that the Arlington stretches of I-395 and I-66 were each backed up 3-4 miles during last night’s commute.
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Chip Moss, 52, of Herndon was driving eastbound on I-66 near the exit to Route 110 around 9:00 this morning when he suffered an apparent heart attack, lost control of his car and crossed through several lanes of traffic. Two people suffered non-life threatening injuries in the resulting seven car pile-up, Arlington police said in a statement.
Moss was rushed to a local hospital while paramedics performed CPR. He was later pronounced dead.
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(Updated at 9:45 a.m.) A four-car accident with injuries has occurred on eastbound I-66 near the Roosevelt Bridge and the ramp to Route 110.
Initial reports suggested one vehicle flipped over — if so it has since been righted. We’re also hearing that CPR was performed on one victim, and that he was rushed to the hospital in full cardiac arrest. (See update here)