Princeton firefighters battled a fire involving a semi hauling cooking oil in the eastbound lanes on Interstate 24 near the Lyon-Caldwell County line overnight.
The Princeton Fire Department was dispatched to the semi fire at the 56-mile marker on I-24 just before 11:15 Tuesday night.
Assistant Fire Chief Tim Cook tells the News Edge the semi was hauling 48,000 pounds of cooking oil that caught fire and was fully engulfed when firefighters arrived on the scene.
He says twelve firemen and three tankers were on the scene for about three hours, and firefighters had to decontaminate at the scene before returning to the station.
According to Cook, Caldwell County Emergency Management, the Caldwell County Sheriff’s Department and the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet assisted firefighters at the scene.
State transportation department spokesman Keith Todd says both eastbound lanes of I-24 were closed until around noon Wednesday.
According to Todd, the fire caused significant damage to the roadway, and engineers assessed the condition of the damaged concrete pavement to come up with a plan for restoring traffic.
