Buses, police cars, salt spreaders: nothing stops on Beaver Hall Hill

Meet the man who filmed the Montreal bus crashes Willem Shepherd arrived at work spotted the bus sliding down Beaver Hall Hill

Going down a hill proved far too difficult for several buses, trucks, and cars on Monday morning.

An STM bus heading downhill on Beaver Hall Hill couldn't stop and rammed into the back of an SUV waiting at the light at Viger Ave., pushing that vehicle into several other cars.

A pickup truck coming along also couldn't stop and rammed the back of the bus.

To make matters worse, seconds later a second bus going downhill was also unable to stop in time and hit the pickup truck, pushing it out of the way before it hit the first bus.

It still had enough momentum to knock that first bus forward.

Minutes later the fire department and police closed the lower section of Beaver Hall Hill, but even then the low-speed carnage didn't stop.

A slow-moving police car locked its tires as it slid into the curb, spun around, then drifted backwards until it bounced into the bus.

And then, several minutes later, a city of Montreal salt-spreading pickup truck lost control and slid -- plow-first -- into the police car.

The Ville-Marie borough held a news conference Monday afternoon, saying that black ice formed spontaneously on the street at around 7 a.m. and that there was dense traffic in the area, so the salt truck did not have time to get to that side of the road before the accident occurred.

It does not appear that anyone was injured in the low speed crashes.

Many more fender-benders and low-speed crashes were reported on Monday as a light dusting of snow fell.