Sgt. Christian Pimentel and Drew Zucala, owner of
Zucala's Towing and Recovery, in front of RISC support vehicle.

On March 14th on Florida's Turnpike in Boca Raton, a tractor-trailer traveling northbound rear-ended a roofing truck, causing thousands of screws and nails to scatter one hundred yards across all northbound lanes during morning rush hour. After all injured motorists were treated and transported by EMS, the Florida Highway Patrol and Turnpike DOT initiated Roadway Incident Scene Clearance (RISC). Within thirty minutes, RISC team members arrived with three 50-ton recovery class wreckers, a huge front-end loader, a street sweeper, a large dumpster on a low boy trailer, and a support vehicle loaded with brooms, cones, traffic arrows, ready-dry for vehicle fluid spills, and a variety of other equipment. Within minutes the team went into action getting the travel lanes open.

The RISC program has been in use on Florida's Turnpike for nearly one year and has resulted in getting the Turnpike travel lanes open in record time after major crashes. Wrecker companies are required to get the roadway open quickly. As a reward they are paid a substantial bonus for quick work.

Sgt. Christian Pimental with the street sweeper (in background)
that was used to sweep up the debris that covered the northbound travel lanes.

In this case, thousands of nails and screws and gallons of sticky roofing tar were removed from the roadway, allowing travel to continue more quickly and reducing the chance of Turnpike travelers getting flat tires. Good job RISC team!