Carnage on roads is worst in decades

A Hastings woman and a married couple from St. Paul were identified Tuesday as the three people in an SUV who were killed southwest of Hastings in a collision with a beer truck the day before.

Lucila Gutierrez Rojas, 42, was driving the SUV, which turned in front of the semitrailer and was hit broadside, authorities said. Her passengers were Norma Sanchez-Navarrete, 24, and Eduardo Bautista-Navarrete, 27.

Also Tuesday, William K. Johnson, 23, of Winger, Minn., was identified as the person killed in a two-vehicle crash at a railroad crossing Monday in northwestern Minnesota.

Johnson was driving a van that rear-ended a semitrailer truck stopped at the crossing on eastbound Hwy. 2 in Erskine, the State Patrol said. Johnson, who was not wearing a seat belt, died at the scene. The semi's driver, Nicholas J. Hemingson, 51, of Coon Rapids, was uninjured.

Those crashes add to the deadliest several days on Minnesota roads in decades.

At least 16 people have been killed on Minnesota roads since Friday, pushing the state's toll above the 100 mark for the year, according to the state Department of Public Safety.

So far this year, at least 101 people have died in Minnesota traffic crashes -- a toll that has exceeded last year's death count of 95 for the same period. An estimated 421 people died in all of 2009, when the 100-death mark came in May.

This year's count includes three pedestrians and six motorcyclists, including a St. Cloud woman -- Mychelle Schmitt, 44 -- who died after the motorcycle on which she was a passenger hit a deer Friday in Rockville.

A head-on collision Sunday killed six young people near Cambridge. On Friday, three teens died in a one-car crash in Winona County. Also, a young woman was killed in a crash on Interstate 35W, near the border of Richfield and Bloomington on Sunday.

Public safety officials say typically warm weather brings higher death counts. They urge drivers to use caution, drive at safe speeds and make sure everyone buckles up. That's been a so-called primary law in Minnesota for nearly a year, meaning police can stop drivers for not using seat belts.

A fatal turn

In the Dakota County triple fatality, the semi driver, Trevor Hubbard, 30, of Northfield, was not hurt. His truck was owned by College City Beverage of Northfield.

Dakota County Sheriff Dave Bellows said Rojas had been heading southwest on County Road 47 in Vermillion Township, approaching Goodwin Avenue, and was ahead of the semi.

A witness told deputies that Rojas' SUV appeared to slow down and make a wide turn when it was struck broadside. The SUV rolled into a ditch, throwing one person out. Bellows said it's unclear whether Rojas was making a U-turn, or whether she had planned to make a right turn.

All three were killed instantly. "I don't know whether they overshot where they wanted to go," Bellows said.

This was the third triple-fatality crash in Dakota County in 14 months.

Joy Powell • 952-882-9017