Truck, van collide in Kentucky; 11 killed

MUNFORDVILLE, Ky. (AP) - A tractor-trailer loaded with auto parts crossed a highway median Friday and slammed head-on into a van carrying a Mennonite family, killing 11 people before dawn on a hilly stretch of interstate.

The dead included an engaged couple and several members of their family, whose house burned down in December. Two children in the van were the only survivors of the crash about 75 miles south of Louisville.

After the collision, the truck smashed into a rock wall and burst into flames. The driver, the lone occupant, was also killed.

A pastor for the family said they were traveling to a wedding in Iowa, and the engaged couple planned their own wedding for July.

"They'll have a wedding in heaven, I guess," said Leroy Kauffman, pastor of Marrowbone Christian Brotherhood.

The crash was the deadliest single accident in Kentucky since a 1988 bus crash in which 27 people died when a church bus carrying a youth group was hit by a drunken driver.

Kauffman said the family was from Burkesville, in southern Kentucky. Those killed were John and Sadie Esh and some of their children and grandchildren. The youngest victim was an infant. The survivors were ages 3 and 5.

Kauffman said John Esh was an assistant pastor at his church in Burkesville, about 55 miles southeast of the crash site. Also killed were a daughter-in-law of the Eshes and another daughter's fiance.

As crews cleaned up debris, one of the workers found a brown woman's purse decorated with pompoms and containing a Bible.

A bulldozer loaded still-smoldering debris from the truck into large containers. Twisted bits of metal littered the roadside.

The heavily damaged van was mostly shrouded with tarpaulins. A bench seat from the van rested on the road with two children's' car seats attached.

The National Transportation Safety Board was dispatching a team to investigate the wreck.