Slip, slidin' away!
Montgomery county residents had a rude awakening this morning. After at least eight accidents occurred along the same stretch of the Capital Beltway , the Maryland State Highway Administration began to "aggressively investigate" what went wrong with pretreating the highway.
It turns out that a contractor pretreated the Beltway with the wrong chemical, making both the Inner and Outer Loops of the ring road that encircles Washington, DC a slippery and treacherous mess. The bridge decks between Bethesda and Silver Spring were the most slippery.
"We use salt brine. They used liquid magnesium combined with salt brine," said Maryland State Highway Administration Spokesman Dave Buck, describing the mistake.
Maryland highway crews corrected the situation by retreated with salt.
