Out-of-control driver plows into Lake Norman road crew, police say. 1 hospitalized.
A worker was hospitalized Friday after an out-of-control driver plowed into the work zone of a utility crew along a notoriously traffic-clogged Lake Norman road, police said.
Several other workers managed to get out of the way moments before the driver of the flatbed truck would have hit them, according to a Mooresville Police Department news release on Facebook.
The driver left the scene, but witnesses snapped photos of the business name and phone number on his truck and police said they soon arrested him.
The driver ran off the side of N.C. 150 at Perth Road in the marked work zone just before 11 a.m., police said.
“The work crew had the work zone properly marked with signage, cones, and lighted vehicles,” according to the police news release. “The injured worker was wearing the proper reflective safety vest.”
The worker suffered serious leg injuries but is expected to recover, police said.
Driver returns after police call him
Witnesses tried to follow the truck as the driver headed west on N.C. 150, police said.
Police said they called the business that owns the truck and spoke with the driver, “advising him to return to the scene, which he did,” according to the release.
The driver, 18-year-old Justin Andrew Terry of Silver Creek, Georgia, was charged with felony hit and run involving injury, and failure to maintain lane control. He was jailed on $10,000 secured bond, police said.
N.C. 150 relief still years away
The Charlotte Observer profiled the road and intersection last year as among the worst in the Charlotte region for congestion and wrecks.
As relief remains years away, drivers stew in miles-long daily backups that worsen with every new mega-subdivision and retail center, the Observer reported at the time.
At peak hours and often other times of the day, traffic backs up for 5 to 6 miles, residents told the newspaper.
The state Department of Transportation has promised relief for decades.
Its latest plan calls for widening 15 miles of N.C. 150 in Iredell and eastern Catawba counties starting later this decade, the Observer previously reported.
The $269.47 million project stretches from just west of the U.S. 21-N.C. 150 interchange in Mooresville to N.C. 16 Bypass in Catawba County.
NCDOT plans to accept bids for and start construction of the Iredell County leg of the expansion in 2025, an NCDOT timetable shows. Construction of the Catawba County stretch would begin in 2029.
This story was originally published October 8, 2022 at 1:27 PM.