A 45-year-old Sumpter Township woman was unresponsive and appeared to be suffering from a head injury, chest injury, and was not breathing very well on her own when emergency crews arrived at the scene of an accident on I-94 at 3:05 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 9.
It is suspected that she, along with two dogs, had been thrown from her vehicle when it rolled over several times before coming to a rest in the grassy shoulder. There were no other people or cars involved.
Van Buren Township Fire Chief Dan Besson said crews were first dispatched to what was described as an injury accident with a rollover and multiple injuries on westbound I-94 between Belleville and Rawsonville Roads.
Chief Besson and both duty crews responded immediately to the scene and were updated while responding that the accident actually was on eastbound I-94, east of Rawsonville Road.
When the fire fighters arrived they found Huron Valley Ambulance paramedics and VBT police officers tending to a female lying in the grassy shoulder of eastbound I-94 near her vehicle.
Chief Besson said he was immediately joined at the scene by Michigan State Police and a few minutes later by additional on-call fire fighters.
In addition to tending to the critical patient, the fire department also shut down all eastbound lanes in order to provide a safe place to land a medical helicopter and provided care and oxygen to the two dogs that were also injured.
The patient was transferred to the Survival Flight crew upon their arrival and flown to the University of Michigan Trauma Center in critical condition. The dogs were rushed to an emergency vet by Animal Control Officer Bob Queener for evaluation.
After Survival Flight left one lane of I-94 freeway was opened up in order to allow traffic to flow around the crash scene again. The fire department remained on the scene assisting VBT police with traffic control. Information regarding circumstances behind the crash is being gathered by the Michigan State Police Accident Investigation Team. The freeway was completely reopened at 5:56 p.m.