ANAHEIM : Trucker Hurt as Rig Flips, Spilling Rice

A trucker was in critical condition Thursday after his tractor-trailer carrying 21 tons of rice overturned as he exited the Santa Ana Freeway.

Officers arriving at the 300 block of North Manchester Avenue about 2:45 a.m. found a tractor towing a 40-foot refrigerated trailer on its side, Lt. Ray Welch said.

George Louis Gower, 43, of Sacramento was pinned inside the cab, Welch said. Anaheim firefighters worked for an hour to rescue him. Gower was taken to UCI Medical Center in Orange with leg and pelvic fractures.

The southbound truck had exited at Lincoln Avenue “at too great a speed to negotiate a curve at the end of a ramp,” Welch said.

It was not clear how fast Gower was going, but the tractor-trailer hit the guardrail and overturned, police said. The trailer slid into a telephone pole and spilled 25-pound and five-pound bags of rice. Officers closed Manchester Avenue and Loara Street while city workers used brooms and shovels to fill four dump trucks with the spilled grain.

The rice, which was headed to the U.S. naval station in San Diego, was taken to the city sanitation department to await pickup by the Navy, said Craig Allan, maintenance crew supervisor.