Coin flip: 8m freshly minted dimes spilled on US highway after truck crash
An avalanche of 8m freshly minted dimes spilled from an overturned truck and closed a Texas highway for almost 14 hours.
Witnesses described a sea of silver on US Route 287 in Alvord, 50 miles north of Fort Worth. Clean-up crews attempted to suck up the coins, worth $800,000, using vacuums more commonly used to unclog sewers and drains.
Officials said the truck involved in the accident was an 18-wheeler from the Colorado-based Western Distributing Transportation Corporation, whose operations feature a fleet of armored vehicles that ferry currency and other valuable cargo for clients including the US government.
The origin of the cash discharged in Tuesday morning's rollover is not known. Both the US treasury department and Western Distributing did not return calls for comment.
Public safety officials in Wise county said the two occupants of the truck, believed to be the driver and an armed guard from Western's US Armored Company Services (USAC) subsidiary, were taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries. No other vehicle was involved.
Footage taken by CBS News Texas showed uniformed USAC employees sifting through dirt, gravel and plants at the side of the roadside to recover some of the coins, while others were collected with shovels and buckets.
The bulk of the money, according to Alvord's mayor, Caleb Caviness, was retrieved with heavy machinery.
'The funniest part to me was that they picked up the dimes using the vacuum trucks that are used to suck out sewage and water and stuff like that,' he told the New York Times.
'We were joking around that the city of Alvord would be metal detecting.'
The Wise County Messenger reported that two southbound lanes of US 287 were closed after the accident shortly after 5.30am, and remained inaccessible until the evening, causing miles-long lines of traffic.
Texas department of safety troopers kept some curious spectators from the scene, although the Times reported than an expected horde of speculators, fired up by rumors circulating in Alvord that the coin spillage was $8m instead of $800,000, 'never showed up'.
According to Western Distribution's website, USAC has more than 40 armored units equipped to safeguard cargo in transit.
'We move cargo for all divisions of the government and were awarded [contracts] to move several of the government's banks over the years,' wording on its website states.
'If it must be secure in transit, any amount, anywhere, USAC can make it happen! We would tell you more about what we can do, but it's confidential!'
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