HOLDEN — A Mingo County man suffered only minor injuries when his pickup truck collided with the rear end of a coal truck on Holden Mountain yesterday afternoon.

Roger Thaxton of Williamson was driving a white Chevrolet Silverado pickup truck owned by Stowers Fire & Safety southbound on U.S. Route 119 near Gaston Caperton Drive on Holden Mountain when he drove his vehicle up under the back end of a slow-moving 18-wheeler coal rig owned by Marcum Transport and driven by James Breeden of Woodville.

The crash occurred just after 1 p.m.

West Virginia State Police Trooper J.D. Hensley said an eye-witness to the crash saw the crash happen.

The eye-witness said it appeared Thaxton was preoccupied in his vehicle when he ran into the rear end of the truck.

“I saw him hit and I was scared when I ran up to the truck,” the eye-witness said.

Thaxton appeared to have suffered an injury to his wrist, Hensley said. Thaxton was transported to Logan Regional Medical Center for treatment. His condition was not available at press time this morning.

“He’s lucky to be alive,” Hensley said.

The Chevy truck was intertwined in the back end of the coal truck and had to be pulled apart by a wrecker truck from Premium Towing.

The Cora Volunteer Fire Department helped with traffic and the cleanup.

Traffic was snarled on the southbound lanes of U.S. Route 119 for nearly an hour.

In an unrelated incident, around the same time, emergency crews were also called out to a crash at Omar.

There were reportedly no injuries in that two-car crash, emergency officials said Tuesday.

Traffic along State Route 44 was stalled due to the crash, reports said.