According to the Tampa Bay Reporter, two head-on crashes in rapid succession caused by an errant wrong-way driver led to one man dead and one woman critically injured in Citrus County this weekend.
The Florida Highway Patrol has not released information about the identities of those involved. However, they have stated that a 19-year-old Crystal River man died and a 66-year-old Clearwater woman was in critical condition.
The crash happened on Sunday morning, around 6:30 a.m. on U.S. Highway 19 North, south of Indian Woods Path, in Citrus County. The Clearwater woman was driving a sedan northbound on Highway 19, but she was in the southbound lane while doing so. She collided head-on with the pickup truck driven by the Crystal River man, which knocked it into the southbound lanes. Shortly after that, an SUV, driven by a 53-year-old Crystal River woman and with a 33-year-old Crystal River woman as a passenger, headed south on U.S. Highway 19 and ran into the pickup truck head-on. Visibility was low since it was still dark at that hour, and they weren’t able to see the crashed vehicles in time.
The SUV driver and passenger only suffered minor injuries in the crash.
No explanation was given by the Florida Highway Patrol for the woman driving in the wrong lanes.
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