RUMFORD – A Mountain Valley High School student was injured Tuesday morning while on her way to school when her car collided head-on with a garbage truck that was driving in the wrong lane, police said.

Vanessa R. Cayer, 16, of Rumford, escaped serious injury in the 7:40 a.m. accident on South Rumford Road, shortly after leaving home in a 1991 Subaru Legacy, investigating Patrolman Douglas Maifeld said Tuesday afternoon.

Cayer, who suffered facial injuries when the car’s airbag deployed, was taken by Med-Care Ambulance to Rumford Hospital, where she was later treated and released.

Maifeld said the accident happened after Cayer rounded a corner in the northbound lane and was blinded by the morning sunlight.

At about the same moment, a southbound 1995 International dump truck, owned by Archie’s Inc. of Mexico and driven by employee Kenneth Robertson, 72, of Rumford Center, crossed the center line and slowed to pick up trash at 263 South Rumford Road, according to Maifeld.

Robertson said he saw Cayer approaching and tried to get off the road. But the Subaru struck the garbage truck’s front, passenger-side corner, crumpled the truck’s fuel tank, and bounced off a tire, coming to rest in the shoulder of the opposite lane.

The impact destroyed the front and passenger side of the Subaru, causing an estimated $5,000 in damage and totaling it, Maifeld said. The truck sustained an estimated $1,000 in damage.

Robertson complained of pain in his right leg, but wasn’t taken by ambulance to the hospital. Garbage collectors Edward Bouchard, 50, and Christopher Jodrey, 33, both of Rumford, who were riding on either corner of the truck, escaped injury, Maifeld said.

South Rumford Road was partially blocked for 90 minutes. Rumford firefighters assisted.

While he didn’t cite Robertson for driving on the wrong side of the road – a common practice for garbage trucks collecting refuse from homes – Maifeld said it is illegal.

“That was my big concern, that they were on the wrong side of the road. It violates the law of operating left of center. Luckily, they’ve never had a problem before. But, today, they did. The girl was lucky, and so were Bouchard and Jodrey, riding on the back,” he added.