A drunken truck driver careened his 18-wheeler into a guardrail on the Long Island Expressway on Monday night, leaving several hundred feet of twisted metal and two downed lamp poles in his wake, cops said.
Timothy Murray, 64, of Mastic was driving a 2016 Freightliner tractor that was pulling a trailer westbound on the LIE in Dix Hills when he ran off the roadway at the right shoulder, according to Suffolk County Police.
Murray then crashed into the guardrail before coming to a stop east of the Exit 50 off-ramp around 7:45 p.m., police said.
He left behind severanl hundred feet of crushed guardrail and two downed street lamps, authorities said.
Another vehicle also became disabled as it passed over the debris in the roadway, cops said.
The destructive crash forced two lanes of the westbound expressway to close for more than six hours so that first responders could remove the vehicles and clean up the mess – including about 50 gallons of spilled diesel fuel, police said.
Murray was arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated, cops said.
He is expected to be arraigned at First District Court in Central Islip on Tuesday.
