39,000 Gallons of Hydrochloric Acid Spilled On Ohio Turnpike

• Not what you want to see on the side of the road.

Truck drivers crash and whatever loads they're hauling spill onto the roadway. This is common enough. Often, if we're lucky, they're carrying marshmallows or beer or chickens or firecrackers — anything that will lend the story a humorous bent. Who doesn't want to envision hundreds of thousands of marshmallows piled up on a four-lane highway? Well, at least if you're not in a car behind the incident, right?

Of course, truckers carry dangerous materials, too. Like hydrochloric acid. And when they crash and that load hits the pavement... well, that's not good for anybody.

So when a trucker apparently fell asleep at the wheel this morning on the Ohio turnpike and his truck crashed, spilling the load of 39,000 gallons of hydrochloric acid near Streetsboro, things were not so light-hearted.

The AP reports:

Sgt. John Miller with the patrol says it appears the driver might have fallen asleep at the wheel before the westbound truck went off the turnpike late Tuesday night and crashed.

Both sides of the turnpike were closed for a time near the Interstate 480 interchange in Streetsboro as crews dealt with cleaning up 39,000 gallons of the acid.

Miller says firefighters temporarily evacuated 20 homes in the area.

The truck's driver was taken to a hospital and was expected to be OK. The accident remains under investigation.

At least it wasn't a Spam spill. That would have been really toxic.