Seriously injured driver airlifted after car and dump truck crash near Rainier Tuesday
A driver was airlifted from Rainier after their car crashed head-on into a dump truck in south Thurston County Tuesday afternoon.
The collision occurred around 2 p.m. outside the town at the intersection of 148th Avenue Southeast and Runyon Road. The SE Thurston Fire Authority and Sheriff Derek Sanders both posted about the incident on Facebook.
Sanders, who was off duty at the time, came across the scene first along with some local residents. Images from the scene show the front of a white car crushed under the large red dump truck off the side of a roadway.
The wreckage began to “smoke and spark” where fluids and battery wires met, Sanders said. The dump truck driver, who was not seriously injured, apparently averted a blaze by disconnecting the batteries just in time, the sheriff said.
Sanders said the collision appeared to be fatal, but the driver of the white car survived with “gruesome injuries.”
“Initially it appeared to be a fatality collision, however this is the first time I’ve ever seen an injured person come back from agonal breathing on their own without medical intervention,” Sanders said in his post. Agonal breathing is short, labored breaths that may only occur a few times per minute.
Due to the severity of the crash, Sanders said there was nothing for him or residents to do but wait for fire personnel to extricate the driver with “jaws of life,” a hydraulic rescue tool that’s used to pry apart wreckage.
“S.E. Thurston Fire Authority arrived on scene and did an incredible job carefully cutting the car apart in minutes, starting with the roof and moving to the doors and B pillar,” Sanders said.
Lacey Fire District 3 paramedics quickly started treating the seriously injured driver and preparing them for air transport, according to the SE Thurston Fire Authority post.
The driver was airlifted from Wilkowski Park in Rainier to a regional trauma center, Sanders said.
“Outstanding work by our firefighters today, highlighting the extremely technical work they do beyond knocking down fires,” Sanders said.
SE Thurston Fire Authority shared gratitude for Sanders and the community members who were at the scene.
“Thank you to Sheriff Sanders and the community members who came upon the scene and provided clear, timely information about the extent of the crash,” the post says. “Their quick actions allowed for an early airlift request and helped ensure a coordinated response.”
Sanders said deputies closed the roadway for an extended period of time to allow for a traffic reconstruction team to analyze the scene of the collision.
In an update to his post, Sanders said the scans of the scene indicted the driver of the white car was traveling the wrong way and the dump truck driver was not at fault.
The dump truck driver swerved to the left to avoid the white car, Sanders said, and the driver of the white car swerved to get back into their correct lane. This led to a head-on collision.
“It is not clear why the driver of the passenger car was driving the wrong way down the road, but it sounds like the driver may have had a number of encounters with (law enforcement) recently involving reckless driving/eluding,” Sanders said.
