A typical day of summer construction came to a sudden halt on Friday when an excavator tipped over onto Interstate 41 over County Road B.
"At that point it becomes safety first for us." DOT Project Manager Matt Ternes said. "Obviously, we'll look at traffic."
Nobody got injured when the machine tipped. DOT officials said that they then tried to keep traffic moving but later found that they'd have to get cars off the highway and onto on and off ramps.
"We weren't expecting it initially to take as long as it did, however, with the safety aspect, we had some of the engineers and contractors that were on site to provide their crews a pick plan," Ternes said.
Crews had to bring in a special crane to lift the excavator. In the afternoon they got it into the air.
"Now that it's out of the way, we're going to be trying to get everything back to the normal traffic pattern, take a look at any damage, and go from there," Ternes said.
Officials at the construction company, Zenith Tech said that they're trying to figure out why the excavator tipped over.
They don't expect it to delay the construction project.
