Pennsylvania
Runaway steel drum from western Pennsylvania construction site kills woman
A steel drum weighing thousands of pounds somehow rolled out of a construction site in Pittsburgh and eventually struck and killed a woman who was walking on a nearby sidewalk, police said.
The accident occurred around 10:40 a.m. Friday in the city’s Oakland neighborhood, where the University of Pittsburgh’s new sports performance center is being built.
The drum was either knocked over or dislodged from a piece of heavy equipment, police said. It then rolled several hundred feet as it went down a hill, through a fence and onto the sidewalk where the woman was walking with co-workers from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Western Psychiatric Hospital. The drum then went across a road before it came to rest against a pickup truck.
The woman, who suffered a head injury, was pronounced dead at the scene a short time later. Her name has not been released, and no other injuries were reported in the accident, which remains under investigation.
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President Trump is visiting the Lehigh Valley next week.
Mr. Trump will speak at Mack Trucks in Macungie, Pennsylvania, Tuesday at 2 p.m. Macungie is roughly 10 miles from Allentown.
Mack Trucks is a 1.7 million square-foot facility in Macungie that assembles heavy-duty trucks for North American and export markets, according to its website.
“Mack Trucks are a symbol of America’s manufacturing strength,” Rep. Dan Meuser said in a Facebook post about Mr. Trump’s upcoming visit to Pennsylvania. “Their Lehigh Valley operations are a pillar of the local economy, employing Pennsylvania workers and driving the nation’s trucking industry.”
In the lead-up to the 2024 election, Mr. Trump visited Pennsylvania, a crucial swing state, multiple times. He’s also visitied during his second term.
In December 2025, Mr. Trump said in a speech in Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania, that he was “crushing” inflation and called affordability concerns a “Democratic hoax.”
One week later, Vice President JD Vance aimed to calm the affordability concerns at a Uline facility in Alburtis, about 13 miles southwest of Allentown.
Tickets are available for Mr. Trump’s visit to Macungie next week on a first-come, first-serve basis.
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