DIXFIELD – One of two young people involved in a car rollover off Route 2 on Friday afternoon suffered critical injuries, said police Sgt. Mark Dow said.
Citing his ongoing investigation, Dow declined to name the 17-year-old male driver or his female passenger, who had to be cut free of the mangled 1996 Pontiac Sunfire by Rumford firefighters.
Dixfield firefighters and a Med-Care medic lifted the girl out of the car on a backboard, carried her to a stretcher on the road and placed her in a Med-Care ambulance.
She was taken to Rumford Hospital then flown to Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, a nursing supervisor in Rumford said.
Because her name was not released, a report on her condition could not be obtained Friday night.
The driver refused treatment at the scene once his mother arrived, Med-Care Director Dean Milligan said.
Dow said the wreck happened about 2:54 p.m. after the eastbound Pontiac rounded a corner opposite the entry into M/T Pockets garage.
“It appears that he was attempting to pass another vehicle, when he lost control, and went off the road on the westbound side,” Dow said.
The car spun 180 degrees and rolled over once “pretty fast,” before landing on its wheels at the edge of a wooded marsh, he said.
Athena Sanders of Jay, a Dirigo High School teacher in Dixfield, was one of four people who witnessed the crash.
“I saw them passing and then all of a sudden, he swerved to the left into the opposite lane,” Sanders said. “I didn’t see the car roll, but it went straight in and a tree came down over the top of it. Then he was out of the car, and he was by her side. She was trapped,” she added.
Sanders said the driver is a student at Dirigo High School and his passenger was a former student at the SAD 21 school.
Milligan said the girl was pinned in by the car’s roof, door, dashboard and tree atop the roof.
Dixfield firefighters cut the tree out of the way, then Rumford firefighters cut the roof and shattered windshield off.
Dow said it was too early in his investigation to determine what caused the car to spin 180 degrees and skid off the road.
He did say there was a pickup truck headed west when the teen-age driver passed in a passing zone.
The truck’s presence “was a contributing factor” in the crash, “but how it contributed, I don’t know yet,” Dow said.
Dixfield firefighters halted traffic until 4:15 p.m., when one lane was opened.
The road was shut down again while M/T Pockets owner Dave Hodgson and mechanic Zach Seelow retrieved and towed the totaled car away.
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