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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- The driver of a Flying J butane tanker that crashed and exploded on U-S 89 last month has pleaded not guilty of causing the catastrophe.
25-year-old Travis McKane Mortensen of Taylorsville made the plea in a Farmington courtroom last week.
Mortensen is accused of knowing his brakes where having problems before he left Wyoming on his way back to Utah and failed to take any steps to solve the problem.
Mortensen said his brakes went when he hit a van. The semi later exploded.
About 15-hundred people were evacuated and two nearby homes were damaged by the fire.
The judge set a hearing for April 14th.
(Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
