RUMFORD – Two utility poles were struck by drivers in two separate accidents within a half mile of each other on Route 2 on Wednesday morning during a snowstorm.

An eastbound tractor-trailer chip truck, owned by Richard Carrier Trucking of Skowhegan, slid off the road at 8:40 a.m. while rounding a corner at Rumford Point, nearly severing a pole, said Rumford Patrolman Paul Casey.

The loaded rig’s trailer sustained minor damage. Driver Eric Brown, 31, of Berlin, N.H., was not injured.

“He was trying to get on the shoulder to be courteous to other operators and slid off the shoulder. He wasn’t going very fast,” Casey said.

A Central Maine Power crew braced the pole instead of replacing it, attaching boards on either side of the damage.

Shortly before this accident, a 2004 Pontiac station wagon driven by Vickie Cuff, 40, of East Andover, slid past the stop sign at the end of Route 5 at 8:24 a.m. and sideswiped a utility pole on Route 2.

Neither Cuff nor her passenger, David Chenery of East Andover, was injured, Casey said.

“Her speed may have been imprudent for weather conditions at the time,” but she was not cited, he said.

The car sustained an estimated $2,000 in damage.