Staff Reports
Two wrecks that occurred within an hour of each other left Interstate 65 south of Seymour closed for about six hours Monday.
Around 2 a.m., Indiana State Police responded to a five-vehicle wreck with injuries in the northbound lanes about four miles south of Seymour. With traffic backed up because of that incident, another wreck occurred about an hour later.
Trooper Jamey Sperle said that in the initial accident, a 2014 Freightliner with a flatbed trailer, driven by Rashon Vaughn, 31, of Birmingham, Alabama, was traveling north when it approached a slowed Toyota Prius, driven by Jack Bower, 25, of Chicago.
Vaughn’s truck hit the rear of Bower’s car and then overturned, spilling a load of steel beams in the median and across the southbound lanes of the interstate. Three vehicles traveling south struck the steel and were damaged, police said.
Bower and a passenger, Anna Machalski, 24, of Chicago, were taken to Schneck Medical Center in Seymour with non-life-threatening injuries.
With the interstate closed because of that wreck, a crash occurred in the northbound lanes about five miles south of Seymour in the backed-up traffic.
Trooper Kyle Stovall said a 2012 Freightliner hauling a box trailer, driven by David Rankin, 58, of Watha, North Carolina, was stopped in traffic when a 1992 Chevrolet Lumina driven by Aaron Strotman, 26, of Indianapolis, struck the rear of the trailer.
Strotman was taken to Scott Memorial Hospital in Scottsburg before being transferred to a Louisville hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Sperle and Stovall were assisted by Sgt. Stephen Wheeles, Sgt. Brian Wilson, Seymour and Crothersville police departments, Seymour and Crothersville-Vernon Township fire departments, Jackson County Emergency Medical Services, Indiana Department of Transportation, 31 Wrecker Service, Hampton Towing, Howard’s Wrecker Service and Seymour Mack.
