Driver dies while being dragged hundreds of feet under truck trailer, SC coroner says

A Charlotte man died when his vehicle got stuck under a tractor trailer and was dragged several hundred feet across a South Carolina interstate, officials say.

It happened around 4:40 p.m. on Thursday, April 27, on Interstate 85 near Blacksburg, according to Cherokee County Coroner Dennis Fowler. The area is near the North Carolina state line, about 45 miles southwest of Charlotte.

Timothy Antonio McNeil, 25, was driving south in a box truck when he slowed for a fatal crash that occurred 5 minutes earlier in the southbound lanes, Fowler said.

His vehicle was then struck by a southbound tractor trailer, officials said.

“After making contact, the tractor trailer dragged the truck several hundred feet before the driver realized it was underneath,” Fowler said.

“The driver of the box truck, Timothy Antonio McNeil ... was pronounced dead at the scene. A passenger in the truck was transported to Spartanburg Medical Center with non-life threatening injuries.”

Investigators say the crash that slowed McNeil’s vehicle occurred at 4:35 p.m. when an SUV driven by Leigh Ann Hamilton Marshall, 56, struck a retainer wall, then veered “into the path of a tractor trailer rig.”

Marshall and a front-seat passenger were trapped in the vehicle. Marshall, who lives on Sullivan’s Island, died at the scene and the passenger was hospitalized, Fowler said.

This story was originally published April 28, 2023 at 7:12 AM with the headline "Driver dies while being dragged hundreds of feet under truck trailer, SC coroner says."