An estimated 2 million bees escaped over the weekend after a semitrailer loaded with honeybee hives overturned in rural Texas, officials and multiple reports said.
Orange County Emergency Services District 4 (OCESD4) said in a statement on social media that the incident occurred on June 21 in Orange County, located in southeast Texas near the Louisiana state line. Emergency officials said an 18-wheeler carrying a beehive had overturned in the neighborhood and that “there was a large number of bees in the area.”
Emergency officials urged residents to stay indoors while officials responded to the scene. Emergency officials said in an update that the rear portion of the neighborhood was closed to traffic as crews continued to work.
“The overturned trailer containing the honeycombs has now been approximately 75% unloaded,” OCESD4 said in an update. “Workers continue to safely transfer the hives to transport trucks, where they will be taken to local honey farms.”
The Guardian newspaper and television station KBTX reported that around 2 million bees were released in the incident. According to local radio station KOGT, the semitrailer was carrying about 50,000 pounds of bees when the driver failed to make a turn and overturned.
Photos shared on Facebook by area beekeeper Queen Bee Supply LLC showed several beekeepers in white hazmat suits and suits clearing the site and working to retrieve the millions of bees that have swarmed the area. Photos also showed bees swarming nearby trees, weighing down the tree’s branches and branches.
USA TODAY has reached out to Orange County Emergency Services and Queen Bee Supply LLC for comment.
Beekeepers continue recovery efforts as bees swarm near Texas
In a video posted to Facebook on June 22, Christy Ray, owner of Queen Bee Supply LLC, said the insects that had swarmed in the bee nucleus, a box that houses a small colony of bees, had moved on by morning.
“We arrived here this morning and they’re all on the fence,” Ray said, explaining that beekeepers need to recapture them.
He noted that “probably only a small percentage” of the bees moved into the fence. Ray said the swarm left in the tree was “more than three times the size” of the bees on the fence, and further swarms had formed in nearby trees and “all over the place.”
Ray also described how on June 21, bees formed a dense clump on another tree that was so heavy that it broke the tree’s branches. “Yesterday they were all up in this tree, and they actually had broken limbs…it was very heavy,” she said.
Beekeepers were working to safely collect the bees and remove them from the neighborhood as quickly as possible. “We’re definitely trying to get them and do what we can to get them out of the area,” Ray said.
Bizarre spills and crashes turn commute into a spectacle
From swarms of bees to rivers of pennies, a spate of freak crashes and cargo spills across the country have turned ordinary highways into scenes of confusion, curiosity, and sometimes unintentional entertainment.
In April, in Tennessee, a pickup truck carrying about 1 million bees overturned near Knoxville, creating a swarm that filled the area. Authorities warned those responding to the scene to avoid the area, and the truck driver, a beekeeper, attempted to retrieve the insect.
Earlier this month, another Tennessee highway was the scene of a serendipitous scene. A brake fire on a trailer carrying fireworks ignited the cargo, setting off a colorful explosion on Interstate 75 near Chattanooga. Onlookers gathered to see the unexpected display, but traffic was blocked as emergency workers rushed to secure the scene.
In March, motorists encountered an entirely different kind of chaos when a trailer loaded with 40,000 pounds of tofu fell off a highway in a Missouri valley, The New York Times reported. Soy-based blocks spilled from the trailer, requiring extensive cleanup.
Food has also been implicated in other bizarre road accidents. In August 2025, a tractor-trailer carrying 40,000 pounds of ribeye steaks caught fire, cooking the cargo and leaving a trail of charred smoke. A year ago in California, a truck spilled boxes of French fries onto part of a Los Angeles freeway, shutting down lanes for hours as crews cleaned up the piles of boxes.
Not everything spilled is edible. In April 2025, an 18-wheeler dropped $800,000 worth of cash on a highway in Texas, leaving coins scattered on the roadway and panicking the crew.
