By Staff
DAMAGE – This Ford Thunderbird came to a rest on the shoulder of U.S. 45 South Wednesday after an 11:15 a.m. accident that sent a second vehicle, a white Toyota Corolla, into a roadside ditch. Photo by Chris Allen Baker / The Meridian Star
By Chris Allen Baker / staff writer
May 16, 2002
Two separate traffic accidents within a mile of each other along a busy stretch of U.S. 45 South sent four people to the hospital on Wednesday.
The more serious accident happened about 11:15 a.m. when a blue Ford Thunderbird driven by Brent Spooner of Stonewall and a white Toyota Corolla driven by Whitney Osburn of Meridian collided at the Luther Walker Road intersection.
Clarkdale Fire Department, the Mississippi Highway Patrol and Clarke County Sheriff Todd Kemp responded to the accident, which occurred about a hundred feet inside Lauderdale County, officers said.
Kemp said Spooner was headed north on U.S. 45 and Osburn was trying to cross the highway when the accident occurred. The impact sent the Toyota into a roadside ditch and Thunderbird onto the shoulder of the highway facing south.
Spooner, 57, and his passenger Michael Williams, 40, of Quitman, were taken to Rush Foundation Hospital. Spooner was treated and released; information was unavailable on Williams.
Firefighters on the scene said Osburn was also taken to a hospital; the hospital and the extent of her injuries was unavailable.
Earlier Wednesday, at about 9:30 a.m., the Clarkdale Fire Department responded to a one-car accident in which Jessica Lindsey of Meridian apparently lost control of her blue two-door sport coupe.
Trooper Jim Richards of the Mississippi Highway Patrol said indications showed Lindsey, 19, may have hit loose gravel and lost control of her vehicle while driving north on U.S. 45 three miles south of Meridian.
The vehicle came to rest in a roadside ditch.
Richards said that Lindsey did not appear to be seriously injured, but was taken by private vehicle to a local hospital.