2 killed in head-on wreck on foggy US-50
Staff writer
A Cottonwood Falls man and a Wichita man died in a head-on collision Thursday morning on a foggy section of US-50 west of Union Rd., between Peabody and Florence.
According to Kansas Highway Patrol, an eastbound 2017 GMC Acadia driven by Travis Alan Flasschoen, 41, of Wichita crossed the centerline and collided head-on with a westbound 2020 Hyundai Santa Fe driven by John M. Ireland, 71, Cottonwood Falls.
Authorities were alerted to the accident at 6:25 a.m. by an automated crash detector.
Deputy Bruce Burke was first on the scene. Undersheriff Larry Starkey, Sheriff Jeff Soyez, Peabody firefighters and rescue squad members, Hillsboro and Marion ambulances, a supervising medic, a medic from Goessel, and at least two state troopers subsequently arrived.
Extra law enforcement officers were needed to block traffic, Starkey said.
“I was mainly trying to keep everyone stopped,” he said. “After the highway patrol got done with their measurements, we had one lane open.”
A woman showed up at the scene because she had received a notification on her cell phone from a Life360 location-sharing app.
One driver was dead when Burke arrived. The other died while being treated inside Marion ambulance. Because of fog, helicopter ambulances were not available.
Both bodies were taken to Yazel-Megli Funeral Home in Marion.