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The driver of the upstate New York truck told police that the load shifted when he swerved to avoid a car that cut him off around 3:30 p.m., Sgt. Glenn Burnet said.
The rig was headed to a plant in Newark that burns the carcasses and then sells the grease for everyday products, such as soap, he told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
Carcass pieces began falling from the top of the trailer onto the road, as well as between the cab and the trailer, before the driver finally stopped about a quarter-mile down the highway near Essex Street, Burnet said.
“You had blood, guts and everything else all over the highway,” he said.
“The smell was potent and terrible,” another law enforcement officer told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
Highway workers responded with a bucket loader, scooping up as many remains as possible and loading them back into the trailer. Firefighters then washed down the roadway.
Things were moving again — although slowly — by 5 p.m.
Bergen County Sheriff’s officers helped with traffic, Burnet said.
Darling Ingredients Inc., which was transporting the load, is North America’s oldest independent rendering company.
It “repurposes” billions of pounds each year of inedible beef, poultry and pork by-products useable and specialty ingredients — including gelatin, tallow, feed-grade fats, meat and bone meal, poultry meal and yellow grease — which are then sold to pharmaceutical, pet food, bio-energy and fertilizer industries worldwide.
CLIFFVIEW PILOT PHOTO
PHOTO: Courtesy of RAY SHATTUCK
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