Police are looking for drivers who ran from the scene that caused the SB I-65 multi-vehicle crash

An accident on Interstate 65 Tuesday morning has blocked lanes on the freeway, causing significant traffic delays toward downtown Louisville.

Louisville Metro Police Fourth Division officers responded to a multi-vehicle crash just after 5:30 a.m. on South I-65 near University Boulevard. When officers arrived, at least five vehicles appeared to be involved in a crash.

LMPD spokesman Aaron Ellis said the preliminary investigation and witness statements indicated that two cars were involved in the initial collision on the highway, and that the drivers in both cars fled the scene. Ellis said one left on foot and the other is believed to have been picked up by another vehicle traveling southbound.

Ellis said three commercial dump trucks traveling south on I-65 approached the first collision and, with little time to react, caused a chain reaction accident. Ellis said a man driving one of the dump trucks was removed from the vehicle by first responders and taken to U of L Hospital with serious injuries and emergency surgery.

The other two drivers were not seriously injured and were checked by emergency services at the scene.

According to TRIMARC, all lanes and the right shoulder of I-65 near the Arthur Street exit are blocked, and they originally forecast a two-hour estimate to clear the scene. Ellis said in an update just before 7:30 a.m. that it will take an “indeterminate” amount of time due to the large amount of diesel fuel that needs to be cleaned up from the saddle tanks rupturing on the vehicles.

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The southbound lanes of I-65 remain blocked and the northbound lanes near the accident will also be reduced, Ellis said. Drivers are encouraged to use surface streets and avoid the highway.

This article originally appeared in the Louisville Courier Journal: Drivers run after crash on SB I-65; 1 pain after stacking 3 trucks