Share Tweet Share Email Comments Print Emergency personnel on the scene of a multi-vehicle collision involving a tractor trailer on I-280 near Walbridge Road in Lake Township on Friday. THE BLADE/KURT STEISS Enlarge | Buy This Image Heavily loaded semi-tractor-trailer rigs that travel at 60, 70, or 80 miles per hour are carrying tons of death-dealing energy, and when those drivers hurtle into a much tinier sedan, or SUV, or minivan, the damage imbalance is enormous. Too often we see innocent people in comparatively tiny sedans and SUVs suffer the consequences of some driver in one of these over-the-road behemoths failing to drive properly. Click here to view more Blade editorials There need to be better safeguards and tougher criminal and civil penalties on truck drivers, who must make safe use of our nation’s highways. Last Friday, two members of a local family from Gibsonburg were killed and a third was severely injured on I-280 in Lake Township when a tractor-trailer rig crashed into a line of backed-up traffic. Lisa Balsizer, 54, and Callie Balsizer, 21, were killed and Carl Balsizer, 65, was injured when their Jeep Wrangler was struck and caught fire in the crash near Walbridge Road. They were hit from behind by a truck driven by Lawrence Nastal III, 28, of Southgate, Mich., on the freeway’s southbound lanes. The tractor-trailer first struck a car before it collided with the Balsizer vehicle and another car, troopers said. The truck then careened off the side of the roadway and… [Read full story]
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