Memphis interstate closed after semi crashes and spills Alfredo sauce

Mere days after a semi truck spilled over 150,000 tomatoes on a California interstate, a similar but separate incident left part of a Tennessee interstate covered in another popular topping more commonly found on al dente spaghetti than on asphalt: Alfredo sauce.

The incident happened on Interstate 55 in Memphis at about 5:00 p.m. on August 30, 2022. While details about the crash remain few and far between, local news channel Action News 5 reports that the truck hit a retaining wall and spilled a trailer’s worth of Alfredo sauce in the northbound lanes. Footage published by television station WREG shows that the sauce was in jars. That means the accident didn’t create a river of rich, creamy Alfredo, but it also means that the crew tasked with cleaning up the mess had to remove broken glass as well.

You can smell it! Memphis police confirm a tractor-trailer carrying Alfredo sauce spilled on I-55 near Riverside Boulevard. @FOX13Memphis pic.twitter.com/VTPVQ8YjYC

— Kate Bieri (@KateBieri)
August 30, 2022

One woman went to the hospital with what Action News 5 describes as “non-critical injuries,” and Fox 13 Memphis wrote that all northbound traffic was shut down immediately after the crash. Some southbound lanes were closed as well to give first responders access to the scene. Law enforcement officers later let traffic crawl by on the northbound shoulder as a tow truck hauled off the trailer’s mangled remains.

First tomatoes, now Alfredo. Some say bad things come in threes; be careful out there, especially if you’re hauling a load of pesto.