The crash involved a semi-truck, an SUV and a trailer and resulted in a fire, the agency said.

Residents of Southern Highlands, near where the crash occurred, said the fire was so intense they could feel the heat from a block away.

“I thought ‘wow, what’s going on, what’s going on,’ I thought it was a small fire, but no, it was a pretty big fire,” said local resident Paul Hoang.

“The noise was so loud we thought it was a plane crash and all we saw were flames, maybe 20 to 30 feet of flames over the wall,” said resident Carlton Thomas.

Jordan Thomas, another resident of the neighborhood, said another crash in the same area recently resulted in flames and forced the busy interstate to be closed for hours.

“It wasn’t the first fire there, there was another fire there just a few months ago and it was just as big, it was a huge explosion,” he said.

State police are still investigating what caused the crash.