These chickens didn’t aim to cross squat

The Associated Press

1/30/2008

EUGENE, Ore. — To head off that old question: The chickens had no intention of crossing the road. Instead, they came crashing off a trailer, in crates, leaving feathers and carcasses on a mile-long stretch of Interstate 5. Oregon State Police said about 20 crates bound for Southern California fell near an exit at Eugene.

Each contained eight to 10 chickens.

Three drivers reported hitting crates.

Some of the fowl died inside, others on the highway or in the snow-filled ditches.

Troopers said they had no estimate of the number.

The driver of a pickup truck, Xin Li, 39, got a $242 ticket for a loose and shifting load that totaled about 160 crates, troopers said. They said straps on Li’s trailer broke.

As the living clucked, a state trooper contemplated the carnage.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” Oregon State Police trooper Blain Hlebechuk told the Eugene Register-Guard. “I’ve never gotten a call about chickens in the roadway.”

Tony Kilmer has. The 15-year veteran of the Oregon Department of Transportation helped to clean up the mess and said it was nothing new.

“A lot of trucks running up and down I-5 dump their loads,” he said. “We’ve cleaned up chickens before. We’ve chased cows and sheep and horses off the road. It happens more often than you’d think.”