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Semi trailer, car crash kills three |
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Wednesday, 05 December 2007 |
By ANNIE ZELM
Staff Writer
Three men died Tuesday afternoon in a two-vehicle collision involving a semi-trailer and a passenger car on Interstate-75 north of Wapakoneta.
The collision occurred at 4:22 p.m., in front of a rest area at mile marker 114 on the southbound lanes of Interstate 75. The three men who died from injuries suffered in the collision are from Anna and Sidney.
“It appears the passenger car was going northbound and crossed the median for an unknown reason,” Ohio State Highway Patrol Lt. Scott Carrico said as troopers from the Wapakoneta Post worked with officials from other Auglaize County agencies to clear the scene. “It was then hit head-on by the semi, which was southbound on I-75.”
The collision pushed both vehicles off the right side of southbound I-75.
Auglaize County Coroner Dr. Thomas Freytag and Assistant Coroner Lt. Steve Stienecker pronounced the three occupants of the passenger vehicle, a 2001 Chevrolet Malibu, dead at the scene.
Alex G. Vanhook, 20, 1077 Millcreek Road, Sidney, was the driver of the Chevy Malibu and was wearing his seat belt. Eric A. Davidson, 20, 722 Michigan St., Sidney, who was a front-seat passenger, wore his seat belt, and Justin W. Bryiant, 23, 7878 State Route 274, Anna, who sat in the left-rear passenger, was not wearing a seat belt.
The three occupants of the vehicle were transported to the Bayliff & Eley Funeral Home in Wapakoneta.
The vehicle sustained severe damage.
The driver of the 2000 Volvo semi-trailer, Daniel Petrus Rotaru, 36, 2112 Harned Drive, Troy, Mich., suffered minor injuries.
Alcohol is not suspected as a factor in the collision, a Highway Patrol spokesman said.
The cause of the collision remains under investigation.Protocol calls for tests to be run on the deceased.
The southbound side of the Interstate-75 was shutdown to one lane of traffic for several hours after the crash, and officials cleared the scene at approximately 7 p.m.
The collision resulted in a diesel spill, which officials and crews from the Auglaize County Emergency Management Agency (EMA) worked to contain and then to remove.
The collision resulted in an estimated 100 to 125 gallons of diesel fuel to spill, which officials and crews from the county EMA worked to contain and then to remove.
“On the semi, we were able to talk to the driver and calculate how much fuel he had, but the car also had a ruptured gasoline tank,” EMA Director Troy Anderson told the Wapakoneta Daily News in a telephone interview this morning. “The biggest concern was a storm sewer catch basin located about 2 feet from the car ... and anything going into it could get into the Auglaize River.
“Also with the gasoline vapors, we didn’t want anything there that might become an explosive hazard,” he said.
Anderson said officials were able to stop the spill from flowing into the catch basin using absorbent padding. They remained on the scene until approximately 8:30 p.m.
A crew from Allied Environment of Lima also responded to the scene after it was cleared and dug approximately 10 inches of soil out of the 20- by 40-foot area where the vehicles ssat.
The crew plans to purge the soil so it can be re-used and re-sod the area after the snow is removed, Anderson said.
The Ohio State Highway Patrol received mutual aid from the Auglaize County Sheriff’s Office, Auglaize County Office of Homeland Security and EMA, Wapakoneta Fire Department and an official from the Auglaize County Prosecutor’s Office. |
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 06 December 2007 )
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