http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/07/21/national/printable3085151.sh
tml


Ohio Ambulance Crash Kills 5

VAN WERT, Ohio, July 21, 2007
----------------------------------------------------------------------
------
----
(AP) An ambulance headed to a hospital was broadsided by a
semitrailer at a
rural intersection and caught fire Friday night, killing three
emergency
medical technicians and two patients, the State Highway Patrol said.

The patients were being treated for injuries from an earlier car
wreck when
their ambulance was struck in Crane Township, about 65 miles
southwest of
Toledo.

A fourth Antwerp Emergency Medical Services worker, Matt McDougall,
31, of
Antwerp, and the driver of the semitrailer, Gerald Chapman Jr., 54, of
Bryant, Ind., were taken to a hospital for treatment, the patrol
said. Their
conditions were not immediately available.

The crash remained under investigation. The ambulance was traveling
south on
a county road that had stop signs posted for north-south traffic, said
patrol Lt. Shawn Davis. No stop signs were posted for the semitrailer
heading east, Davis said.

Authorities have not said whether the ambulance's emergency sirens and
lights were turned on.

"It's very sad. Very tragic," Antwerp Village Council President Ronald
Farnsworth told The (Toledo) Blade. "Right now, we need all the
prayers we
can get. Right now we're grieving."

Several dozen fire and emergency workers gathered at the village's
fire hall
with a pastor Friday night.

"They aren't in very good shape right now," Farnsworth said. The
village
planned to arrange for counseling, he said.

Killed in the accident were EMS workers Sammy Smith, 64; Heidi
McDougall,
31; and Kelly Rager, 25. All were from Antwerp.

The patients killed were identified as Robert Wells, 64, and Armelda
Wells,
60, both of Hicksville.