FAIRFIELD — Three people were injured, one critically, when a pickup truck traveling in the wrong lane on the Norridgewock Road on Monday collided head-on with an SUV, police said.
The collision occurred shortly before 5:30 p.m. near the intersection with Mae’s Way in Fairfield.
A preliminary investigation determined that a 2009 Ford F-150 was traveling south in the northbound lane when it came upon a northbound 2014 Jeep Compass, according to a news release issued late Monday by Fairfield police. The Jeep was unable to avoid the pickup and the vehicles collided, police said.
State police are reconstructing the wreck and the findings will be reviewed by the district attorney’s office for Somerset and Kennebec counties.
The driver of the pickup was identified by police as 21-year-old Garrett Greene of Oakland. He had a 20-year-old passenger and both were taken to a hospital for treatment of minor injuries. The driver of the Jeep was Christopher Merry, 54, of Norridgewock, police said. He was taken to a Waterville hospital before being transported to Maine Medical Center in Portland in critical condition.
Fairfield police Sgt. Patrick Mank, the primary investigator in the wreck, anticipates there will be charges filed in the case, the release said.
In addition to Fairfield police and state police, also responding to the scene were Fairfield-Benton Fire and Rescue, Delta Ambulance and Clinton police.
It was the second crash on the Norridgewock Road in two days. Sunday morning, four people were injured in a crash at the intersection of Norridgewock Road and Wood Street.
Three of the four injured people were transported to MaineGeneral Medical Center’s Thayer Campus in Waterville. There were no charges filed in the Sunday crash.
“Norridgewock Road is 55 miles per hour for most of it,” Fairfield police spokesman Officer Casey Dugas said. “It’s a matter of people driving the speed limit and paying attention.”
Dugas said one aim of the investigation is to determine what the pickup was doing traveling in the wrong lane.
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