Nine million bees escape following truck accident

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BOZEMAN, Mon. — A trucker in Montana got himself in a sticky situation after rolling over his rig which was transporting nine million honey bees.

The rollover occurred June 14 in Bear Trap Canyon, according to local media.

“I had to kick the windshield out of the front of the cab and the bees were on me from that moment,” truck driver Lane Miller, 41, told local media. “I’ve never felt so much fear in my life.”

Miller got away with minor injuries and about 20 bee stings. Beekeepers were called in to try to clean up the 512 hives that were being transported from Idaho to North Dakota.

“Everybody had literally thousands of bees on them, in their hats and on their suits,” beekeeper Gary Clark said. “When we pulled the boxes out, big globs of them would fall on us.”

The truck itself wasn’t removed from the scene until 3 a.m. Tuesday.

“The bees were so agitated you could barely see the beekeepers or the wreckage itself, just because of the cloud of bees that were swarming,” said fire chief Shawn Christiansen.

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