Uncategorized

Six-year-old hospitalized after six-car crash on Kuebler Boulevard Wednesday

Salem police are investigating a crash involving six vehicles Wednesday afternoon that left a child hospitalized with life-threatening injuries.

Salem Police Department officers responded around 3:56 p.m. to a “serious injury collision” near the intersection of Kuebler Boulevard Southeast and 36th Avenue Southeast, according to a Thursday news release.

Witnesses said they saw a 1-ton truck pulling a loaded dump trailer traveling east on Kuebler Boulevard near 36th Avenue. They said it struck a Kia Soul also moving eastbound on Kuebler, “which was stopped in heavy traffic,” the news release said.

The truck pushed the Kia Soul forward into a Dodge Ram truck, and the chain reaction hit two other vehicles ahead of the truck.

Several of the drivers reported minor injuries but didn’t need to be transported to hospital, according to the news release. A six-year-old child riding in the rear passenger seat of the Kia Soul was taken in an ambulance to Salem Health with life-threatening injuries, and was later transported by Life Flight helicopter to a hospital in the Portland area for additional treatment.

“Due to the serious nature of the incident, the Salem Police Department Traffic Team responded to conduct a crash reconstruction and investigation,” the news release said.

All of the drivers stayed on scene and are cooperating with the investigation, and no arrests or citations have been made, the news release said. The department said no additional information about the crash was available.

-Ardeshir Tabrizian