'Totally my bad': Teen admits to cutting off tanker truck, causing chemical spill that killed 5

A 17-year-old Ohio girl who unknowingly caused a tanker-truck crash that spilled thousands of gallons of ammonia and killed five people in central Illinois told investigators it was "totally my bad" when she eventually saw dash-cam video from the truck.

According to a report released by the National Transportation Safety Board, the teen was driving with her mother and brother to visit her mother's boyfriend in the Illinois suburbs of St. Louis in September 2023. An accident on Interstate 70 earlier that night diverted loads of traffic onto U.S. 40, a two-lane highway.

Dashcam video from a tanker truck shows the teen cut off a tanker truck while trying to pass it at a high speed. The truck was carrying caustic anhydrous ammonia – used by farmers to add nitrogen fertilizer to the soil and in large buildings as a refrigerant – when it jack-knifed and hit a utility trailer parked just off the highway.

The trailer's hitch punctured the tank, spilling thousands of gallons of anhydrous ammonia on the highway just west of Teutopolis, a community about 110 miles northeast of St. Louis. The six-inch puncture in the tanker released a plume of poisonous gas into the air.

Kenneth Bryan and his children – Walker, 10, and Rosie, 7 – were outside their home in a driveway when the crash occurred.

Bryan and his children died from ammonia exposure, as did the Rev. Dan J. Smith, a Missouri pastor, and Vasile Cricovan, a 31-year-old Moldovan immigrant truck driver, according to The Independent. Both Cricovan and Smith were driving along the same stretch of road where the crash occurred.

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About 500 people were evacuated for hours after the accident to avoid more chemical exposure.

When investigators located and questioned the teen, she admitted it was her who cut off the tanker while trying to pass it.

"Oh, (expletive). Yeah. Oh, my goodness. Yep, totally my bad. Wow. Holy (expletive)," the girl said while watching the video from the ill-fated truck during an Oct. 4, 2023, Illinois State Police interview.

The teen said her passing of the tanker began in a passing zone, although a no-passing sign appears in the video. She said once she began passing, she realized she needed to accelerate to clear oncoming traffic and estimated she was going 90 mph when she pulled back to the right, narrowly slipping by an oncoming vehicle. She told investigators her mother was upset by the close call, but she thought she had plenty of clearance.

She said before the family's return trip to Ohio, when her mother was reading aloud news accounts of the crash, she had no idea it had happened.

"Of course not," she told investigators. "I told you that like three times."

When one of the investigators expressed disbelief that no one in the car noticed a truck turning over behind them, she doubled down.

"Nobody said, ‘Oh, the guy behind you drove off the road,’ " the girl said. "That would've been a huge deal for everybody. We would've been like, ‘Oh, (expletive), I just caused something really bad to happen,' and then like our whole night would’ve been figuring out" what to do.

She also declined the police interviewers' offer to show the dash-cam video again.

"No, you don't have to. It was totally my fault," the girl said. "I've honestly in the past had times when I just don't use good judgment in judging like distances and whether I have enough time for something."

The transportation board said its latest findings are merely a factual account and do not include analysis or conclusions, which are expected later. The Illinois State Police conducted its own investigation, and spokeswoman Melaney Arnold said the department turned over its findings last month to Effingham County State's Attorney Aaron Jones. Jones has not commented on the status of the case, according to the Associated Press.