The famed roadway was packed with beach traffic on the summer-like Saturday when two vehicles collided in the initial crash, then eight more became entangled in the wreckage, Newport Beach police Lt. Bill Hartford said.

Three adults from two vehicles were declared dead at the scene and three others were taken to hospitals with injuries, one of them critical.

Two cars were overturned, some people were trapped inside their vehicles, and it took hours before some of the dead could be removed from the wreckage.

“Officers responding found glass strewn on both sides of the roadway, up onto the sidewalk, indicating a very violent traffic collision,” Hartford said.

Sam Schudi was driving one of the cars involved, with his wife Kelli in the passenger seat. They say an oncoming car hit a car two vehicles in front of them and became airborne.

“I heard the screech and the sound, and all the sudden I saw this car come flying in the air,” Kelli Schudi told KCAL-TV. The couple was not among the injured.

The highway remained closed hours after the accident and was likely to be shut down through the night.

The famous highway runs along the ocean through many of California’s most scenic stretches and most expensive neighborhoods.