NORTH FORK – First responders were busy in the North Fork area this afternoon as two separate rollover crashes blocked traffic on Roads 222 and 200.
At 3:19 p.m. the report came in to 911 of a Dodge Durango on its roof just south of La Cabana on Road 222 in North Fork. It was the same corner and the exact same location where another vehicle rolled on Sunday evening.
Firefighters from Station #11 and Engine #4275 from Rancheria responded, and after determining that no one involved was injured, they set to work directing traffic around the wreck while waiting for the tow truck to arrive.
A few minutes later, a CHP officer responding to that crash was headed north on Road 200 just past the Bass Fork Minit Mart at Road 221, when he saw that a southbound Nissan Xterra was approaching a tight curve over a bridge at a rate of speed too fast for conditions.
Fearing the worst, he turned around to go back and check, and found the Nissan crashed on its side in the southbound lane.
Cindy Gaspara of Coarsegold was at first feared pinned in the vehicle, but with the officer’s assistance, she got out of the SUV and escaped the incident without injury.
It appeared to the officer that the Nissan slipped, not on the ice, but in the sand along the road. As has been shown in many winter crashes, the sand can be as dangerous as the ice when speeds are too fast for conditions.
Firefighters who were on scene at the Road 222 crash headed out to assist with the one on Road 200. The roadway was closed for about 15 minutes as the scene was cleared.
