Thousands of hapless travelers were trapped Wednesday on the Long Beach Freeway, and a possibly related accident resulted in the death of one man, as police waited out a kidnapping suspect whose getaway car had stalled on the highway.
Drivers of cars and big rigs alike sat in their vehicles and stewed as the lines of traffic stretched farther than they could see.
One hour turned to another, and the stretch of freeway that carries 215,000 vehicles a day remained gridlocked as morning turned to afternoon. More than four hours later, a man in a white T-shirt wanted in the reported kidnapping of a young woman late last year emerged from a maroon Ford minivan in South Gate and gave himself up.
Just as the afternoon rush hour was getting into full swing about 4 p.m., traffic began to roll on the 710 Freeway, but it would be hours before the flow returned to normal on one of the region's key arteries.
The congestion spilled over to other freeways across southeastern Los Angeles County, particularly the Harbor, San Diego and 605, as motorists and trucks -- robbed of the main route between the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach and points inland -- searched for alternative routes.
Trips that normally took 30 minutes turned into hours-long ordeals, as the California Highway Patrol closed off about seven miles of the 710 in both directions between East Los Angeles and Lynwood.
"You have the largest concentration of trucks -- probably in the world -- on a very small footprint, between the ports and the rail yards," said Patti Senecal, vice president of Transport Express, a trucking and distribution center in Rancho Dominguez struggling to cope with the gridlock. "So every freeway hiccup, we feel. Instantly."
Trucker Vincent Bayliss, 42, was hauling a load for Whole Foods Market when he got caught in a traffic jam a few blocks from the standoff.
Congestion on surface streets was so bad that he could only get out of his truck and stand, frustrated, near Firestone Boulevard and Rayo Avenue in South Gate, unable to keep his delivery schedule.
"I am a bit upset," he said. "I like to be on time."
But a nearby trucker was more philosophical as he waited out the backup.
"I am cool," said Ronnie Roush, 27, of Florence Food Delivery. "I get paid by the hour."
More than two hours after the freeway was closed, a man was killed in an accident a few miles north of the blockage as vehicles slowed suddenly for traffic, according to the Highway Patrol.
