Fatality Crash on Keystone Road in Tarpon Springs
Posted: December 6, 2015
Units from multiple agencies were dispatched to a traffic crash at about 5:35 PM on Saturday, December 5, 2015. The crash occurred at 2211 Keystone Road between US-19 and East Lake Road in Unincorporated Tarpon Springs.
Arriving units reported two vehicles with heavy damage with one smoking from a small fire. Three patients were evaluated by paramedics. The determination was made that one person was deceased and two other required further medical evaluation. One of those injured occupants was heavily entrapped and required firefighters to work about 85 minutes to free that person. Bayflite landed very close to the crash and was able to transport the occupant once freed from the wreckage. The other injured occupant was transported to Bayonet Point Medical Center.
According to Florida Highway Patrol, 58 year-old Rick Dunning of Misick, Michigan was driving a 1997 Chevy Tahoe. He was traveling eastbound on Keystone Road in the inside lane approaching George Street South.
Jane Elizabeth Dietz, age 51 of New Port Richey, Florida was traveling westbound on Keystone Road. Dietz was traveling in a 1996 GMC Sierra with 45 year-old Tarpon Springs resident James Paul Wells as her passenger.
FHP reports that Dunning lost control of his vehicle which traveled over the center grass median and into the westbound lanes. He collided nearly head-on with the Sierra.
Wells, the passenger in the Sierra died at the scene of the crash from traumatic injuries. Dietz was transported via Bayflite to Bayonet Point Medical Center in critical condition once she was removed from the heavily damaged vehicle. Dunning, the driver of the Tahoe, was transported in serious condition also to Bayonet Point Medical Center
Charges are pending at this time and alcohol does not appear to have played a role in the crash according to Troopers. The report indicates that Wells, who died in the crash, was the only person not wearing a seatbelt.
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