Tunnel fatalities

A 14-year car thief killed two women in a head-on smash in the middle of MdTA’s Fort McHenry tunnel in Baltimore Aug 11 at 6:27am. The boy was driving a Dodge Neon he stole in Joppa MD. He drove northbound through the outside northbound tube without incident but on approaching the toll plaza he had a minor scrape-&-dent collision attempting to cut in front of another patron in the toll lanes. The 14-year old apparently thinking he’d be arrested at the toll plaza then did a U-turn and returned southbound through the tunnel – which has four 2-lane tubes – taking the inside northbound lanes. He ignored large red ‘Do Not Enter’ signage and dodged several vehicles coming northbound, before the collision mid-tunnel with a Toyota Corolla carrying three women in their early 30s. The airbags of both vehicles inflated. The 14-yr boy and the woman driving the Toyota survived but her two women passengers died within hours in hospital. Children of 2 and 4 were orphaned as a result, their father having been killed a year ago in another smash.

The second tube was closed for 2hrs 40mins and rush hour traffic northbound was forced to use the single outer tube. Traffic backed up about a mile. Lori Vidil MdTA spokesman said she’d never heard of anyone deliberately driving the wrong way through a tunnel before. The McHenry tunnel carries I-95 and has a 24-lane toll plaza located on the northern approaches. Pity the kid didn’t run an M-TAG (ET-only) toll lane. They are heavily underutilized and it is usually a straight shot through.

Baltimore police are under fire. The car driven by the 14-yr old was twice reported stolen, including by the boy’s mother who told them where he had parked it. The cops made no move to get it out of the kid’s control and back to its owner.