Driver Inattention Cause of Deadly Gainesville, I35, Crashes

Stephens, Anderson & Cummings, LLP

Thousands of vehicles are driven along Interstate 35 south of Gainesville, and the majority of their drivers heed several signs warning of a temporary construction zone at a bridge spanning Elm Creek, officials said.

But that didn't happen twice within the past 30 days, and both times, people died.

The most recent fatal wreck was around noon Monday about two miles southwest of Gainesville, when a tractor-trailer driven by James Crayton, 59, of Dallas hit the rear car in a northbound traffic jam, officials said.

The fiery crash killed Anthony and Kimberly Brandon of Bedford and Darryl Hoosier, 55, of Lafayette, La.

The tractor-trailer was operated by Bradco Supply, a building material distribution company with offices throughout the country. An official with the company’s Irving office referred all questions to their corporate headquarters in New Jersey. A message left there late in the afternoon on Tuesday was not returned.

A similar wreck happened July 5 about six miles south of Gainesville, when a tractor-trailer driven by Randy Crume of Harrah, Okla., came upon the slowed traffic and slammed into a sports utility vehicle. Fatally injured were Gervious Hinkle and his 13-year-old grandson, Casey.

But although both wrecks involved big rigs, the trucking industry was not the problem, said Texas Highway Patrol Trooper Mark Tackett, who responded to both emergencies.

"We probably have had tens of thousands of trucks go through there during a period of bad construction and there has been only two wrecks," Tackett said. "It's not the commercial traffic.

"It's the individual driver."

Investigations continued Tuesday in both wrecks, and neither truck driver had yet to be charged, Tackett said.

Investigators, he said, first must examine a wide range of issues, including mechanical workings on the trucks, toxicology reports on the drivers and how long they had been on the road before the wrecks.

The construction project, which began May 26, is repairing a 70-year-old bridge over Elm Creek, said Adele Lewis, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Transportation in Wichita Falls.

But highway officials saw early in the project that more was needed to ease highway congestion leading to the bridge project.

To that end, TxDOT parked portable electronic signs mounted on trailers to warn motorists about the construction ahead.

The first portable electronic sign is at Mile Marker 488, about seven miles south of Gainesville, and just north of the community of Valley View, Tackett said.

After that there are similar signs spaced about a mile apart at Mile Markers 490, 491, 493 and 495.

Also, there are two electronic signs at Mile Marker 494; one is portable and the other is a large permanent electronic sign that reports various information, including the Amber Alerts, Tackett said.

He said traffic is narrowed down to one lane for about a mile, starting 3/4 of mile before the bridge construction at Elm Creek.

It continues across the bridge, which is about a quarter mile long and then opens back up to two lanes on the north side of the bridge, he said.

At Mile Marker 495, there is a digital sign that reports radar-detected speed of oncoming traffic. There are also fixed non-electronic construction signs, Tackett said.

"If they're driving a tractor-trailer, as soon as they see that first sign they need to be slowing down," Tackett said. "Most do exactly what they're supposed to do.

"It's not motorists being caught off guard by this. It's one guy, every time, not paying attention and slamming into everybody else."

Neighbors of the Brandons remained stunned Tuesday in the couple’s Bedford neighborhood.

“I’m still upset,” neighbor Helen Smith said Tuesday who has known the couple for several years. “We’ll probably just go to their church.”

Anthony, 48, and Kimberly, 47, had three daughters and the family was members of Harwood Terrace Baptist Church in Bedford. Church officials did not return telephone calls Tuesday.

One of the daughters, Alicia Brandon, just graduated from L.D. Bell High School in Hurst just a few weeks ago, a school district official said Tuesday.

Also hurt in the wreck Monday was Carol Whaley, 63, of Yalaha, Fla., who was transported by helicopter ambulance to John Peter Smith Hospital in Fort Worth. His wife, Linda Whaley, 61, was taken to North Texas Medical Center in Gainesville. The couple was treated and released shortly after the accident, officials said.

The contractor on the $200,000 project, KKM Construction of Texarkana, Ark., missed its 45-day deadline on Monday, Lewis said. She added that the work is 50 percent complete but the company has said the work will be finished by the end of August.

Nevertheless, TxDOT is preparing to charge "liquidated damages," in which the department starts to dock the contractor for its contracted compensation, Lewis said.