According to the Paducah Police Department, 84-year-old Mary V. Shay of St. Petersburg, FL, was driving her car east and passing a tractor-trailer rig when the truck turned on its signal to change lanes. Shay said she tried to avoid the truck, but it hit the passenger side of her car and forced it into the cable barrier in the median.
Shay said her car then spun back into the road and hit the truck’s trailer. Her car came to rest against the cable barrier.
Shay’s passenger, 74-year-old Myrtle Sachs, of Clearwater, FL, agreed that the truck signaled to change lanes and hit the front of Shay’s vehicle, but said she remembered nothing after the initial collision. A witness confirmed the women’s account.
The truck driver, 58-year-old Donald W. Necessary of Bristol, VA, said he saw Shay’s vehicle swerving in his mirror and knew it was going to hit his trailer. He denied attempting to change lanes.
Shay and Sachs were taken to Lourdes Hospital for treatment of their injuries. Necessary was not injured in the crash.
