Rock Slides Injure Five, Block Road

Rocks the size of buses crashed from a mountainside onto Interstate 40 early Tuesday in the Smoky Mountains, blocking traffic in both directions. Five motorists were injured.

Rain may have contributed to the slide, said engineer Rick Styles of the state Department of Transportation.

The five injured people were in stable condition at Haywood Community Hospital. Highway Patrol Capt. M.G. Hayes said he didn’t know how they were injured.

The slide occurred in the Pigeon River gorge, an area prone to occasional rock slides in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, just a mile from the Tennessee state line.

The highway is the major east-west artery linking western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee.