Two elderly people had to be cut from a mangled vehicle Saturday morning after a single-vehicle crash on State Route 177 north of the Redlands 10 Freeway near Desert Center, and both were rushed to a hospital by helicopter. The cause of the wreck remained under investigation as of Saturday evening.
According to MyNewsLA.com, the crash was reported around 11:10 a.m. Saturday, per the CHP incident log. Emergency crews arrived to find the two elderly occupants trapped inside the vehicle and had to extricate them before air ambulances could take over.
The outlet reports that the Riverside County Fire Department described one of the two victims as suffering major injuries, while the department also described one victim as suffering moderate injuries. It is not clear from the available reporting which of the two patients sustained which level of injury.
Investigation Into the Crash Continues
As of Saturday evening, the cause of the crash had not been determined, and the investigation into what led to the wreck was ongoing, the report notes. No further details about the vehicle involved or the circumstances leading up to the crash were available.
A Remote Stretch With a History of Serious Wrecks
Desert Center, a small unincorporated community along Interstate 10 in Riverside County, has seen other serious crashes on its surrounding highways in recent memory. In August, a vehicle overturned and caught fire on westbound Interstate 10 near Desert Center, leaving one person with critical injuries, according to KESQ. In 2023, a five-vehicle crash on Interstate 10 near Desert Center left four people hurt, with three extricated from their vehicles and two flown to a trauma center with major injuries, as reported by The Desert Sun. And in 2017, a head-on collision between a passenger car and a big rig roughly 19 miles north of Desert Center killed four people, according to KTLA. The available evidence does not establish a broader crash trend in the area, but the stretch of highway has been the site of multiple serious incidents over the years.
