PHOENIX — Within a week, four people were killed and about a dozen were sent to the hospital due to multiple wrong-way crashes in the Valley.
On Sunday, a 17-year-old girl and another teenager were killed in two separate incidents that happened just a few hours apart.
Phoenix police said two adults and five children were in the car when the driver of a pick-up truck hit them while going in the wrong direction. All seven were taken to the hospital. Police said the driver of the truck was arrested for DUI and manslaughter.
“I think by a wide mile impaired drivers are the number one culprits when it comes to wrong-way driving,” Bart Graves a spokesperson for the Arizona Department of Public Safety said.
In most situations, Graves said wrong-way drivers usually correct themselves. However, that wasn't the situation early Thursday when DPS said an 82-year-old woman started driving against traffic on State Route 51.
“This person was determined to keep going wherever she thought she was going and she would have killed someone," Graves said.
It ended with two troopers crashing their vehicles into the woman's car to get it to stop. Those troopers were sent to the hospital with minor injuries.
“If troopers are in the area, they will stop that vehicle with their own vehicles and put their own lives at stake in doing so,” Graves said.
The Arizona Department of Transportation continues its expansion of wrong-way driving alerts. Steve Elliott a spokesperson for ADOT said they are adding more thermal cameras along freeways that notify troopers and drivers if a driver is heading their way.
“There’s a lot that is telling people they are going the wrong way," Elliott said.
ADOT recommends that if someone sees those warning signs of a wrong-way driver to quickly and safely exit the roadway as soon as possible.
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