Dec. 20—ALTON — A bizarre accident Thursday on the Homer Adams Parkway extension injured a young woman seriously and left veteran fire chiefs scratching their heads to figure out just how the car ended up 100 feet from the roadway in a deep ravine facing the opposite way from how she started. Firefighters and police received the call at about 11 a.m. Thursday in the northbound lanes of the extension near the railroad viaduct.
The driver of a silver sedan, reported to be an 18-year-old woman, left the roadway northbound on the extension just before the start of a guardrail meant to prevent just such a thing from happening. Her car drove through a ditch and managed to thread between two of three closely clustered utility poles without striking them. Then the car dropped about 50 feet down the embankment, crushing the top of the car, and landing in a deep ravine meant to carry water to the nearby Wood River Creek.
The car ended up wedged in the ravine facing the wrong direction. Police were the first to arrive and find the driver had left the road about 100 yards away from the car.
Officers climbed over and all around the car as best they could, locating the badly injured driver inside. Firefighters arrived and called for assistance from the East Alton Fire Department and East Alton Police. Firefighters used hydraulic rescue tools to free the trapped woman.
An Alton Police officer climbed into the crushed car to help remove her out the rear window. Several people helped carry the woman up the steep embankment to an Alton Fire Department ambulance.
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Shortly after arriving, firefighters called for an ARCH Air Medical Services Inc. helicopter ambulance. Originally sent to Alton Memorial Hospital, the helicopter was diverted closer to the scene, landing in the parking lot of the former Best Western Premier hotel on College Avenue, now called The Great Rivers Hotel.
A crowd from nearby businesses came out to watch the helicopter land on the hotel’s parking lot. The woman was airlifted to a St. Louis trauma center for treatment. Alton Police were investigating the cause of the crash Thursday afternoon. Alton Police Chief Jarrett Ford said Friday the young woman was in stable condition in the Intensive Care Unit of a St. Louis hospital.
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