ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST PARISH, La. — It was clear Saturday afternoon, but I-10 was closed at the Bonnet Carre Spillway for two hours Saturday morning. Louisiana State Police said there were a dozen crashes all during severe fog.
"It was very foggy. It was very foggy," Evan Palmer said. "It was really thick."
Palmer is a swamp tour guild. He was driving a van load of tourists to a kayak tour Saturday morning when they hit dead stop traffic on I-10 over the Bonnet Carre Spillway.
"Just stopped so I told the tourists in the back, 'get ready, we could be here for hours,'" he said.
He was right. They sat on the bridge for two hours. Louisiana State Police said there were 12 crashes involving 35 vehicles on the Bonnet Carre Spillway Bridge. The interstate shut down in both directions around 10:45 a.m. and it was closed to traffic for about two hours. The crashes happened during a fog event.
"Today was probably the worst fog I've seen on that stretch of I-10," Palmer said.
Louisiana State Police said the crashes were mostly a result of the careless operation and speeding in foggy conditions. There were some minor to moderate injuries.
"Biggest thing is just to recognize this is a hazardous situation, slow down a little bit," Carlton Dufrechou, General Manager of the Causeway Bridge, said.
Causeway Police have been seeing the same foggy conditions over Lake Pontchartrain. For the last few days, Causeway Police have been checking visibility regularly to potentially put restrictions in place. They haven't had to just yet.
"Not yet, but it's that time of the year where the water temperature on Lake Pontchartrain and the air temperature are the same so it’s a good time to plan for fog, leave ahead of time," Dufrechou said. "The fog can be in patches so you can be traveling along at a high rate of speed very quickly and all of a sudden it will gray out."
Our WWLTV Weather Team warns drivers that conditions may allow for more fog late Saturday night into mid-morning Sunday.