Brunswick County Sheriff’s Office (BCSO) asked St. James to shut down its scheduled shredding event Saturday morning after a car accident on N.C. 211 made an already messy traffic situation even worse.

Vehicles began showing up to the drop-off event more than an hour before its 9 a.m. start time, which led to the new parking lot at the community center filling up earlier than expected. Organizers decided to start 30 minutes early to get traffic moving, but no one anticipated the number of cars that showed up over the next two hours.