Moo-ve over! Cow causes traffic jam on I-79 in Butler County

It’s a drive Lindsey Hayes makes every day from her home in Evans City to her job in New Kensington.

But Wednesday was... different.

“I’m just minding my own business listening to music, and I look over in the median, and there is a cow, walking up the middle of the median,” Hayes told Channel 11’s Andrew Havranek.

Viewer video sent to Channel 11 shows what Hayes and so many drivers saw on their drive between Evans City and Cranberry Wednesday morning. A cow, roaming the grassy median of I-79.

The video was taken by Bryan Cipoletti, who was on his way to the airport.

Cow on the loose on I-79 in Butler County causes traffic backups

“There were probably six or seven PennDOT employees and at least one state police person that was trying to corral the bull to try and get him under control,” Cipoletti told Channel 11 from his seat on the plane.

State police tell Channel 11 that 911 received several calls about the cow moving freely on I-79, and they were sent out to the scene just after 7 a.m.

“What was sort of going through your mind?” Havranek asked Hayes.

“First, I didn’t believe my eyes,” she said. “I had no idea what I just saw. I mean, it’s not an every day thing you just see that. I was in disbelief and then I was thinking you only see that in PA. Western PA.”

Traffic was backed up for several hours in both directions until the cow was taken into custody.

“They finally started to let traffic go slowly by in one lane far to the right,” Cipoletti said. “I rolled down my window and said to the PennDOT guy, ‘wow you don’t see that every day!’ and he was good natured and said, ‘yeah that was a first for me, too.’”

Hayes is an equine massage therapist. She has traveled the country and worked on a dude ranch in Wyoming. She has experience wrangling cows.

“I actually had a lot of my friends reach out to me and said we’re waiting to see you on the news because you’d be the one to catch it! So, if I didn’t have to go to work I definitely would have stopped. I thought about it,” she said.

State police say they do not know where the cow came from. They’ve checked with local farms, but their cows are all accounted for.

Troopers said a man on horseback was able to lasso the cow — and they temporarily moved it to a nearby farm just after 10 a.m.

“That definitely will be a pretty memorable experience,” Hayes said.

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