[6/9/03]Two wrecks, near Bolton and in Vicksburg, caused Interstate 20 traffic to slow to a crawl for hours this morning.

In the Bolton wreck, reported at 5:10 a.m., an 18-wheeler was destroyed by fire after the driver, traveling west, lost control and hit an abandoned car on the shoulder of the highway, said Maurice Kennedy, a trooper with the Mississippi Highway Patrol.

The truck crossed into the eastbound lanes, where it caught on fire, Kennedy said.

“The seatbelts saved us,” said driver Taranjit Singh, 27, of Ontario, Canada. “That’s why we are still alive.”

He said he and his passenger, Gurdip Singh, 30, also of Ontario but not related, were traveling to Monroe, La., and did not know how they would return to Canada. The truck’s cargo bay was empty, but personal items were in the passenger compartment.

“We don’t have anything,” he said. “Everything is burned out.”

The two men were not taken to a hospital.

The wreck occured about 5:10 a.m. Eastbound I-20 traffic was routed onto U.S. 80 at Edwards and allowed back on the interstate at Bolton while workers removed remains of the burned truck and cleaned soot and ash from the interstate.

The detour remained in effect for more than four hours.

The second tie-up on the interstate was caused by a wreck on I-20 East near the Wisconsin Avenue overpass in Vicksburg.

Fran Jeffers, a spokesman for the Vicksburg Police Department, said no one was seriously injured in the accident, but she had no other information.

Passers-by said an 18-wheeler, a pickup and a passenger car appeared to be involved.