Tractor Trailer Crash Spills Fuel, Cruiser Struck On Route 1

SAUGUS, MA — A pair of crashes on Route One in Saugus sent at least two people to the hospital and snarled northbound traffic out of Boston on Friday morning.

The right lane of Route One northbound had reopened just before 9 a.m. after a full closure across lanes earlier in the morning, according to State Police. All lanes reopened later in the morning.

Friday's first crash took place on Route One north in Saugus near the roadway’s interchange with Walnut Street at the Breakheart Reservation at 5:20 a.m., according to State Police. A tractor trailer and a Lexus vehicle collided. The Lexus’ 42-year-old Topsfield driver and the truck’s 53-year-old Bronx, NY driver both avoided injury, State Police said.

A tractor trailer fuel tank ruptured, though, spilling diesel across part of Route One and prompting cleanup efforts, according to State Police.

The crash near Walnut Street immediately began slowing traffic behind it on Route One. A second crash then came less than a half mile to the south and 25 minutes later, also on Route One's northbound side, when State Police said a Revere man failed to stop his car, hitting a Ford F150 and pushing it into the side of a State Police cruiser.

Both the Revere man and the Ford operator, a Danvers man, 59, were taken to area hospitals with minor injuries, according to State Police.

A State Police trooper was uninjured.