A 15-year-old Bellevue girl was treated and released at St. Luke's Wood River Medical Center on Monday after being injured earlier in a rush-hour, three-vehicle, chain-reaction traffic accident on state Highway 75 about a quarter mile south of its intersection with Elkhorn Road.
The Blaine County Sheriff's Office identified the victim as Stephanie Guzman.
The Ketchum Fire Department reported that the girl received minor injuries from air-bag deployment in a vehicle.
The accident occurred at 7:55 a.m., snarling commuter traffic and backing it up in the northbound highway lane for several miles for more than an hour.
<
"Boy, did they cause a traffic jam," said Ketchum Fire Department Chief Mike Elle.
Sheriff's Lt. Jay Davis identified the drivers involved as Erick Workman, 30, of Gannett, driving a 1994 brown GMC Sierra pickup, Natalie Rangel, 21, of Hailey, driving a 2007 maroon GMC Acadia, and Jacqueline Guzman-Gutierrez, 19, of Bellevue, driving a 1998 maroon Dodge Caravan. Davis said the injured girl was a passenger in the Guzman-Gutierrez vehicle.
All three vehicles were northbound.
Davis said Workman and Rangel were stopped at the traffic light and Guzman-Gutierrez "looked away for a moment" and collided with the Workman vehicle, pushing it into the vehicle driven by Rangel.
The accident remained under investigation Tuesday. The Sheriff's Office report did not state whether those involved were wearing seatbelts.
Terry Smith: tsmith@mtexpress.com
