Highway 99 in Fresno has a history of fog-related pileups. These were the deadliest
The Tule fog has a long history of putting the San Joaquin Valley under conditions ripe for catastrophe, a situation made deadly over Fresno’s history when drivers haven’t taken precautions on Highway 99.
The Fresno Bee archives list deadly pileup collisions from Kingsburg in the south to Livingston to the north with sprawling crash sites from 15 vehicles up to 90. The large pileups date back to at least the 1990s and only grew larger as the highway expanded.
The latest pileup happened about 9:15 a.m. Sunday, Jan. 11, on the southbound side of Highway 99 between North and Cedar avenues, where 17 vehicles were involved. A 61-year-old driver was killed in the crash as the visibility got down to about a dozen feet, according to CHP.
Speeding drivers and fog can be a deadly mix, according to California Highway Patrol officer Mike Salas, a Fresno-area spokesperson for the agency.
“We really play off of drivers behavior out there. If they’re driving great, if they’re behaving and driving below the speed limit — like they should in foggy conditions — we typically don’t have that many issues,” he said. “But when, unfortunately, we have a driver or two that decides to drive like it was a normal, clear day — that’s unfortunate.”
Salas warned drivers to consider that if they are involved in a crash in thick fog, the first responders have to respond in that thick fog, compounding the issues. They’ll rush to the aid of those injured but they also have to drive at a safe speed, he said.
The Valley’s bowl-shaped geography leads to the Tule fog, which is dense and can stick around, according to meteorologist Emily Wilson of the National Weather Center in Hanford. Warmer metropolitan areas like Fresno can cause the fog to burn off quicker as the sun rises than more rural or far-flung agricultural land along Highway 99.
“Our fog just persists for multiple hours into the afternoon because of the meteorological physics. That’s just the uniqueness of the Tule fog,” she said. “And it is also pretty difficult to forecast for even a seasoned meteorologist.”
When the Valley gets moisture, like the rain that fell at the end of last year, and then becomes dry, it’s prone to heavier fog, she said. If there is no wind to push still air from hanging over the Valley after that rainfall, the moisture adds to the fog.
Fog is also forecast in the Valley for at least the next week.
Major fog-related crashes along Highway 99 since 1990
Here are some of the most serious fog-related crashes on Highway 99 in the past four decades, according to Bee archives.
Nov. 3, 2007: An 86-vehicle chain-reaction crash on Highway 99 just south of Fresno killed two people and injured 41. Damaged vehicles were in three large clusters along a nearly one-mile stretch of Highway 99 between Clovis and American avenues. Officials initially thought the wreckage included as many as 108 vehicles.
Nov. 14, 1998: A fiery 74-vehicle pileup on Highway 99 near Kingsburg killed two people and left 51 injured. The sprawling crash, scattered in four twisted heaps of the southbound lanes, closed a 25-mile stretch of the highway for nearly 12 hours.
Oct. 30, 1997: A chain-reaction crash involving 15 vehicles blocked the southbound lanes of Highway 99 at Fairmead south of Chowchilla. Three people are hospitalized following the early-morning accident.
Nov. 27, 1996: Two big rigs collided and triggered a series of accidents that snarled traffic for hours along Highway 99 north of Livingston. Sixteen people were injured in collisions involving 25 vehicles.
Feb. 7, 1991: A series of accidents on Highway 99 south of Fresno took four lives, including a woman who was hit after leaving her car. Thirty people were injured in the freeway pileup involving 74 cars and ranging from Clovis Avenue to Jensen Avenue.
Jan. 23, 1990: Five people were killed in a succession of accidents on northbound Highway 99 near Selma. Thirty others were injured, and 40 to 60 vehicles were involved in crashes between Manning Avenue and Second Street.
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This story was originally published January 17, 2026 at 1:01 PM.
