A 36-year-old Columbus woman has died after losing control of her car on the ramp from East Main Street to northbound Interstate 270, sending the vehicle into a light pole alongside the roadway. Maxine Ohakim was the only person in the car and was rushed to a hospital with critical injuries before she died shortly after being hospitalized.
According to WSYX, Columbus police are still investigating what led up to the crash. Investigators with the department are working to determine exactly why Ohakim lost control on the ramp before her vehicle struck the pole. The Columbus Division of Police Accident Investigation Unit, which can be reached at 614-645-4767, routinely handles fatal single-vehicle crashes like this one and submits electronic OH-1 traffic crash reports to the Ohio Department of Public Safety for statewide record-keeping, per the Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission.
Anyone with information can also submit anonymous tips to Ohio Crime Stoppers at 614-461-8477, the same report notes. Whether speed, roadway conditions, or a vehicle malfunction contributed to Ohakim losing control remains an open question, and it is not yet clear whether the forthcoming accident report will identify additional factors.
A Ramp With a History of Trouble
The East Main Street interchange with I-270 has seen deadly crashes before. In September 2025, a driver was killed in a single-vehicle crash on southbound I-270 near East Main Street when their car struck a guardrail around 2:25 a.m., according to 10TV. Years earlier, in June 2021, an early-morning crash on I-270 South at the same interchange left a driver in critical condition after the vehicle hit a wall at 2:48 a.m., 10TV reported at the time.
The corridor's troubles extend beyond the freeway itself. In February 2026, a driver traveling west on East Main Street between I-270 and Noe Bixby Road struck a pedestrian in the roadway around 10 p.m., critically injuring the victim, the outlet's reporting shows.
Franklin County Leads the State in Fatal Crashes
Ohakim's death adds to a grim statistical picture for the region. Franklin County recorded 531 fatal crashes between 2021 and 2025, the highest county total in Ohio, with 16% of those incidents attributed to unsafe driving speeds, according to data shared in a Facebook post citing county crash statistics. In just the first four months of 2026, law enforcement recorded 786 total crashes on I-270 in Franklin County, with 144 attributed directly to unsafe speed, the same statistics show.
Fixed-object collisions like the one that killed Ohakim are far from rare on Ohio roads. Fixed-object impacts, including light poles, guardrails, and bridge abutments, account for approximately 26% of all studied roadway crashes statewide, per safety analysis guidelines published in July 2026 by the Ohio Department of Transportation.
Freeways Fall Outside Columbus's Vision Zero Push
The crash also highlights a jurisdictional gap in how Columbus approaches traffic safety. While the city operates a Vision Zero initiative aiming to eliminate traffic deaths by 2035, the program explicitly excludes interstate highways such as I-270, which remain under state highway patrol and state transportation jurisdiction, according to WOSU. That leaves freeway safety heavily dependent on state agencies and targeted law enforcement blitzes rather than the city's own street-design interventions.
Columbus has still moved to address speeding on surface streets near the interstate. In June 2026, the Columbus Division of Police Traffic Operations Unit partnered with Vision Zero to launch targeted monthly speed enforcement zones across nine high-injury city corridors, per a city press release. Past targeted enforcement on I-270 itself has shown results: a nine-month state campaign in Franklin County previously reduced fatal crashes on the outerbelt by 79%, dropping fatalities from 14 to three, according to data from the Ohio Statistics and Analytics for Traffic Safety program.
Ohakim's death is the latest in a string of fatal I-270 crashes Hoodline has covered in recent months, including a predawn Tuttle Crossing crash in May and an April wrong-way collision that also left one person dead. Columbus police have not yet released further details on what caused Ohakim to lose control of her vehicle, and the investigation into the crash remains active.
