Transportation Minister says team is looking for ways to avoid repeat of deadly flyover crash

Ontario's Transportation Minister Prabmeet Sarkaria says his team is looking into how contractors clear roadways following a fatal flyover crash.

Ontario’s Transportation Minister says his department is looking for ways to ensure a tragedy that happened in Kitchener, Ont. is never repeated.

Uyen Nguyen, 38, had been on her way to work at Toyota in Cambridge on the morning of Jan. 26 when her vehicle plunged over the side of the Highway 8 flyover in Kitchener. Her vehicle landed on its roof and she did not survive.

At the time of the deadly crash, a thick buildup and snow and ice had been piled up along the sides of the flyover, leading to questions about how street clearing efforts are handled.

During a stop in Stratford, Ont. on Friday, Ontario’s Transportation Minister Prabmeet Sarkaria addressed the crash.

“We saw some record snowfall that occurred across our highway systems,” Sarkaria said. “When we look at the ramps, the one in question, there was a pileup of snow on the side. There’s a variety of things that we can unpack from that incident. We, 100 per cent, have to be more vigilant in ensuring that we are slowing down as we go through some of these areas when the weather conditions are such. We’re looking back at that incident, unpacking it with our contractors and seeing how we can improve upon the clearing standards.”

He said his department is examining snow clearing across all highways.

“We’re taking that very seriously. We’re making sure that our teams are looking at it and making sure that it never happens again,” he added.

“We hold our teams to a high account,” he continued. “We expect the safest operations from any of our contractors. Where there is wrongdoing, as the minister, we will ensure that the contractor is held liable for that. Now, there’s various parts to an investigation that will occur, whether that’s through law enforcement – we will cooperate in any way, shape or form. If there’s civil lawsuits that follow, we’ll definitely follow through any obligations to work through that. But any incident that involves a casualty, a death, across our highway network, we’ll work very closely to ensure that can be avoided in the future.”

Legal action

Uyen’s family has described her as kind, compassionate and outgoing.

She was the oldest of four siblings and came to Canada from Vietnam when she was 5-years-old.

After the collision, her family visited the crash site to say a traditional Vietnamese prayer for her.

According to her brother Henry, while the family was onsite, road crews began cleaning up the snow from the ramp.

“In the middle of the prayer, I see snow come over the side of the ramp. I was like, ‘Oh, okay.... you decide to clean the snow now’” Henry said.

Henry believes the piled snow played a major role in Uyen’s crash and, ultimately, her death.

“I saw the pictures the day after and you see a guy standing on top of those snowbanks, and the snowbanks go up to over the rails. The guardrails are there to prevent something like this happening,” said Henry.

The day after the crash, the Ontario Provincial Police defended the decision to reopen the road after a previous crash that saw a vehicle launch off the ramp. They said a consultation with the Ministry of Transportation led to the reopening of the road.

The Nguyen family is pursuing legal action and have retained a lawyer.

“There’s a lot of unanswered questions,” personal injury lawyer Nick de Koning, who is involved in the family’s case, told CTV News in February. “The obvious big concern is the accumulation of snow along the side, close to the guardrails of the overpass that lead to a situation where a person could ramp up and go over the edge. That’s completely abnormal, a completely unusual situation.”