TEMPLE (March 12, 2009)--Accommodations have been found for about 50 hotel guests who were displaced Thursday when a 90,000-pound 18-wheeler veered off Interstate 35, crossed two ditches and an access road and then shot up an embankment and slammed into a first-floor room of the Temple Residence Inn.

The crash set off a small fire, which led to an evacuation of the three-story, 103-room hotel.

Police said the truck ended up about 30 feet inside the building.

Guests and employees found temporary shelter from the cold and wet in a nearby Room Store.

Thursday night, they’re staying at other affiliated Marriot Hotels in Temple.

Firefighters and police officers will help guests who need to return to their rooms in the damaged hotel Thursday night to retrieve luggage and other belongings.

A woman who was in a room across the hall from the wall through which the truck crashed was taken to Scott & White Hospital for treatment of leg lacerations.

No one else in the hotel was seriously injured, but the driver of the 18-wheeler was trapped in the wreckage of the cab for about an hour Thursday morning.

Police don’t yet know why Gustavo Rodriguez, 50, of Eagle Pass lost control of the rig around 8:45 a.m. Thursday as he drove north on the Interstate through Temple, but said he evidently lost consciousness.

The truck, which police say weighed at least 30 tons or 60,000 pounds with its cargo, was traveling at least 70 miles per hour when it veered off the highway, crossed two ditches and the northbound frontage road before shooting up a retaining wall.

The truck was airborne when it slammed into a first floor room.

The occupants were eating breakfast and were not injured.

Temple Fire and Rescue personnel searched the wreckage of the room above where the truck hit to make sure the occupant wasn’t trapped in the rubble.

That person was found later found safe, outside the hotel.

Police said Thursday afternoon the truck traveled about 550 feet from the frontage road to the hotel and said it was airborne for the last 100 feet of that distance.

After rescuers freed him, Rodriguez was taken to Scott and White Hospital for treatment of injuries police said were not life threatening.

About 70 Temple police officers and firefighters responded to the scene.

They conducted a door-to-door search of the hotel to make sure everyone got out safely.

Firefighters from surrounding communities were dispatched to help at the scene and to provide fire coverage in other parts of the city because virtually all of Temple Fire and Rescue’s equipment was committed to the hotel search.