48 vehicular accidents reported Thursday due to winter-weather conditions

Bloomington police officers were kept busy Thursday evening after the end of the week’s temperature plunge that lead to an onslaught of weather-related traffic accidents.

Between 5 and 8 p.m. Thursday was the busiest part of the evening for officers, Lt. Steve Kellams said.

BPD responded to 58 calls, the majority of which were weather and traffic-related.
Of those, 48 incidents were traffic accidents, Kellams said, including a number of incidents in which cars had slid off roadways.

Although accidents occurred in many areas of Bloomington, about five accidents occurred at the intersection of 17th and Monroe streets.

Also, State Road 37 and West Vernal Pike was a “skating rink,” Kellams said.
Kellams said 15 BPD officers and detectives, as well as three supervisors, were working Thursday night.

All personnel responded to accidents and filled out crash reports, a task detectives and supervisors aren’t usually responsible for.

He also said Indiana State Police and the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office had a comparable influx of reports.

City and county dispatch, which answers calls from outside Bloomington as well as within the city limits, answered 121 weather and traffic-related between 5 and 8 p.m. Thursday.

No fatalities or major injuries resulted from any of the reported accidents, Kellams said.

— Kirsten Clark