VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — A dive crew has recovered the body of the driver whose tractor-trailer crashed off the side of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel on Thursday.
The driver of the vehicle has been identified as Christopher A. Scott, 36, of Henrico. Scott was driving a tractor-trailer owned by Keep It Moving 22 LLC, according to Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel spokesman Thomas R. Anderson III.
“The thoughts and prayers of everyone at the CBBT are with the family and loved ones of Mr. Scott during this difficult time,” said Jeff Holland, CBBT executive director.
A Crofton Diving crew from Portsmouth recovered Scott’s body and the truck around 3 p.m. Friday. Coast Guard response crews received notification at 9:30 a.m. that salvage crews had found the operator dead in the cab of the truck.
The update came shortly after Coast Guard said the case was reclassified from a rescue to a recovery operation. The Coast Guard and other local agencies officially suspended their search.
“This is a deeply tragic conclusion,” said Capt. Jennifer Stockwell, commander of Coast Guard Sector Virginia. “We had hoped for a different outcome; our thoughts are now with the family in the days and weeks ahead.”
Scott’s family tells 10 On Your Side he’ll be remembered as a social butterfly who loved his family and would give you the shirt off his back. Scott’s mom Cye Cye says he got his CDL last August and her son’s goal was to own multiple trucks and contract them out.
Scott is survived by his mother, a host of brothers and sisters, and his three children, the youngest, a baby boy, was just born Friday – the same day his father’s body was recovered.
Stockwell had said previously that the driver, Scott, was likely inside of the cab of the truck and already dead.
“All indications are that he is deceased if he is still inside the cab of the truck,” Stockwell said at the time. “Again we have strong indications that’s he’s inside, we’re still looking at all aspects of this case, but really focusing on the recovery aspects of the truck right now.”
The crash happened around 1:50 p.m. Thursday at the 1 MP northbound, between Virginia Beach and the bridge’s southernmost island and the Thimble Shoals Channel tunnel, Anderson said. The truck went off the west side (left side of the northbound span).
The Coast Guard said it was notified at about 2 p.m. “that the truck with trailer attached went over the rail with at least one person inside roughly one mile from Chic’s Beach.”
That triggered a major response, with boats from the Coast Guard, Joint Expeditionary Base-Little Creek, Virginia Beach Police Department and Virginia Marine Resources Commission deployed to look for the driver, as well as a helicopter from Coast Guard Air Station Elizabeth City.
Stockwell said the recovery process on Friday had some challenging circumstances.
“The truck went between the northbound and the southbound bridges so the salvage aspect is a bit more challenging than just being able to directly lift it up out of the water.”
A witness to the crash, Skylar Angell, said she heard what happened on the bridge.
“We were sitting here watching the bridge, you know, it’s kind of cool to see, and we heard a loud, crashing noise,” Angell said. “It was very distinct. It sounded like some kind of collision. And I looked over not thinking anything of it, and seeing a large, white square, which seemed to be a tractor-trailer to me, turns out it was. It was pretty scary.”
A single lane of northbound traffic on the CBBT remained open around the site of the crash while CBBT maintenance crews made repairs to the guardrail and the curb, Anderson said. The left lane would remain closed until repairs are finished, which was expected to take about a week, he said.
The bridge-tunnel was closed to all northbound traffic for about two hours Thursday as authorities investigated. A single lane remained open for northbound traffic around the site of the crash as CBBT crews had begun the work to repair guardrail and curb damage.
The crash and its cause are still under investigation by Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel police.
Thursday’s overboard crash is one of several in the 59-year-old bridge-tunnel’s history. The latest was in December 2020, which took the life of box truck driver Erik Mezick.
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