PENDLTON —A Pendleton woman was arrested on a drunk driving charge Monday after the car she was driving collided with a dump truck protecting a road crew on Interstate 69.
According to the Indiana State Police, Rachel Whited, 30, of Pendleton tested four times the legal blood-alcohol limit of .08 percent after her vehicle struck the truck shortly after 10:30 p.m. Her vehicle was traveling northbound in the passing lane south of the Pendleton exit.
No one was injured in the crash.
According to state police, ISP Sergeant Scott Jarvis was stationed in vehicle in the passing lane, with his emergency lights on, when he saw in his rear view mirror “a car approaching at a high rate of speed in the closed left lane.”
Jarvis, whose vehicle was positioned in front of a message board that alerted motorists the left lane was closed for roadwork; Jarvis pulled his vehicle left to avoid being hit, and the car swerved right just missing his police car, the press release said.
After passing Jarvis, the car continued north several hundred yards, missing one arrow-board truck that was directing motorists into the right lane; but the car swerved left crashing into a second arrow-board dump truck.
The second dump truck was loaded with sand and fitted with a special rear crash bumper, providing protection for workers who were ahead of the truck sealing cracks in the road.
Jarvis reached the crashed car and found the driver, Whited, uninjured but showing signs of impairment.
Further investigation by Jarvis found Whited had four times the legal limit of alcohol in her system, testing .32 percent on an alcohol test.
Whited was booked into the Madison County Jail for operating while intoxicated, endangerment, with further charges possible pending review by the Madison County Prosecutor’s Office, according to the ISP.
“It is unfortunate that despite all the signage, police lights and other lighting at a construction zone that workers have to rely on a crash truck to keep them safe,” Jarvis wrote in the press release.
The truck did serve its purpose, though, he wrote.
According to the ISP, state law requires motorists slow down and move over for emergency and service vehicles, including construction trucks.
