ALEXANDER – A tractor-trailer truck loaded with 20 tons of salt used to pack fish destined for a company in southern Maine rolled over on Route 9 early Monday morning.

Around 4:30 a.m. a 2003 Western Star truck owned by Murray Enterprises of Sussex, New Brunswick, was traveling west on Route 9 in the area of the South Princeton Road when its load shifted and the tractor-trailer went off the road and onto the soft shoulder.

When the driver, Colin McGaw, 53, of Saint John, New Brunswick, tried to bring the 18-wheeler back onto the road, it turned over, said Deputy Brandon Parker of the Washington County Sheriff’s Department.

“He’d just come over the hill, and the trailer lurched to the right and it put him in the gravel, and it basically sucked the whole 18-wheeler down in, and when he tried to correct, he started rolling over,” the deputy said.

The truck took out a utility pole, and power and telephone service to the area was out for a short time.

McGaw, who was traveling at about 45 mph, was wearing a seat belt and was not injured. “He was checked out by an ambulance crew and he was fine,” the deputy said.

An excavator from a local company was used to break open the trailer, and the 20 1-ton bags were unloaded onto a flatbed truck. None of the bags was damaged.

Rolfe Towing of Milbridge sent two trucks to help right the trailer. “They had two of their big trucks and flipped it back upright and towed it to the [Irving] Big Stop [on Routes 9 and 1 in Baileyville],” the deputy said.

Route 9 was closed for about 20 minutes, although it was one-lane traffic for most of the day.