Truck carrying dead bird flu ducks crashes in Indiana, sparks hazmat response
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Emergency management responded to a hazardous materials situation Friday morning after a waste management truck carrying ducks that died of bird flu crashed into a ditch alongside a highway, according to officials.
The truck rolled into a ditch along U.S. Route 33 in Churubusco in northern Indiana just after 8 a.m., forcing the highway to close in both directions, the Whitley County Emergency Management Agency said in a news alert.
The scene was surrounded by a 30-foot perimeter as a precaution and there is no known threat to public health at this time, the agency said.
“Waste management, Maple Leaf Farms and the Indiana Animal Health Board are working together to assemble an expert team to handle the cleanup,” the agency said.
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Bird flu warning sign. (File photo by Matt Cardy/Getty Images)
Smith County Fire Department, Whitley Sheriff’s Department, Churubusco Police Department and Whitley County Emergency Management responded to the incident.
“Due to the emergency situation, avoid the area of 650 East and US 33 north of Churubusco,” the agency said on social media Friday morning.
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A duckling vaccinated against bird flu. (Gaizka Iroz/AFP via Getty Images)
The dead ducks had been collected from several Maple Leaf Farms in Northern Michigan, and all were infected with bird flu.
The H5N1 Avian Flu epidemic has been ongoing in the United States for the past several years and has caused the deaths of hundreds of millions of birds.
Ducks on a farm in New York. (Thomas A. Ferrara/Newsday RM via Getty Images)
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Bird flu is highly contagious among birds and some mammals but is not easily transmitted to humans.
“Humans rarely contract avian influenza, but this usually occurs after close, unprotected exposure (without respiratory or eye protection) to birds or other animals infected with avian influenza A viruses,” the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website writes.
