Incident # 24-06551 - At 09:38 on Friday morning 23-August, a southbound Toyota Sienna minivan left Interstate 95 just before Exit 57. The van drove behind a guard rail and plummeted over the embankment crashing head-on on to Bells Hwy. below the Interstate. The van then overturned receiving heavy damage. Four children and two adults from New Jersey, all unrestrained, were injured. One female child and an adult male received critical life threatening injuries and an adult female suffered serious injuries. The three other male children received multiple non-life threatening injuries. Fortunately the van did not strike any other vehicles on Bells Hwy. 9-1-1 initially received multiple reports indicating there were several people injured. Two Fire-Rescue Ambulances were assigned to the incident. Medic 7 arrived and requested two additional ambulances and two medical helicopters, advising of a total of six patients. Two additional Fire-Rescue ambulances responded. All patients were treated at the scene by Firefighter-Paramedics. CARE Flight, based in Walterboro, was out of service for maintenance and the second helicopter had an extended ETA. Medic 1 transported the adult male emergent to the Trauma Center at MUSC. They picked up the CAREFlight Flight Crew enroute to assist with the patient care during the hour long transport. The adult female was also transported emergent to MUSC. The critically injured child was transported emergent to Shawn Jenkins Children's Trauma Center at MUSC in Fire-Rescue Medic 26. The other children were also transported to Shawn Jenkins by Fire-Rescue Medic 9. Westbound traffic on Bells Hwy. was disrupted for about an hour until the accident could be cleared. The SC Highway Patrol is investigating the crash. Walterboro Police assisted with traffic control at the busy interchange.
Medic 1, Medic 7, Medic 9, Medic 26, Battalion 1, Car 103, Car 105, Car 111, Car 112, Car 118, and Walterboro Police and Fire Dept responded. Captain KC Campbell served as Incident Commander.
