Fatality on I-435 before Chiefs Game
 

I heard Andy mention this in his press conference but hadn't seen any news about it. Apparently the wreck was caused by a cop. Man, and I'm sure the backup trying to get into the stadium from Johnson County was a mess. Story is here:

https://www.kansascity.com/news/loca...220422195.html

KCPD spokesman Capt. Lionel Colón describes a fatal crash involving a police vehicle on Interstate 435 ahead of Sunday night's Chiefs football game. One person died. Two were critically injured. The officer suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

By Joe Robertson

A fatal crash that blocked Chiefs game traffic on Interstate 435 Sunday afternoon started when an off-duty Kansas City police officer in a department van rear-ended another vehicle, police said.

“This is a tough one,” Kansas City police Capt. Lionel Colón said Sunday night, as he spoke about the multi-vehicle crash that left one person dead, two critically injured and the officer hospitalized with injuries that were not thought to be life-threatening.

“We hurt with you,” he said, speaking to families of the victims of the crash.

The crash happened shortly after 4 p.m. in the northbound lanes of I-435 just south of Stadium Drive.

Colón said the police van rear-ended a vehicle and then two other vehicles were also involved in the crash.

Traffic was quickly reduced to one lane, and then was completely shut down by 5 p.m. Traffic backed up for some three miles as Kansas City police crash specialists investigated the scene.

Colón said Kansas City Police Chief Rick Smith “is shaken” to hear that an officer has been involved in a fatal crash. “We all are,” Colón said.

Late Sunday night, police released more details of the crash. The police van, a blue Ford E350, came upon slow traffic that was lining up on the way to Arrowhead Stadium. The van ran into the rear of a Maroon Mitsubishi Lancer, knocking it into a white Ford Edge, which was forced into a black Chevy Suburban.

The police van hit both the Mitsubishi and the Ford Edge before coming to rest to the north of all three other vehicles in the crash.

The driver of the Mitsubishi was pronounced dead at the scene. Two passengers in the front and rear of the car were hospitalized with life-threatening injuries. No one in the Ford Edge or the Suburban were seriously injured.

The name of the person killed in the crash had not yet been released Sunday night.

There was no indication in the preliminary investigation of the scene that any of the drivers in the crash were impaired.

The off-duty officer was on the way to Arrowhead Stadium, Colón said, but it was not known if he was going to work at the game or going as a spectator.

Many police staff are on-call and will use police vehicles while off-duty so that they can quickly respond if they are called into action, he said.

The highway remained shut down for most of three hours leading up to the game, which kicked off at 7:20 p.m. at Arrowhead.

Man, that's rough.

We got stuck in that. Delayed us almost an hour getting in to the stadium. The lancer looked like a crushed soda can. I'm surprised the other two passengers weren't killed at the scene. After witnessing that we were just happy we made it to the game alive.

My daughter says the driver that was killed is a Shawnee Mission South Senior. Chandan Rajanna was driving his father and sister to the game and they are in serious condition but Chandan was dead on the scene. My daughter had him in a couple of classes and said he was a really nice kid.

The school has grief counselors on site today. Very sad.

Has all the earmarks of an inattentive or distracted driver just flat killing someone. I mean he had to have not hardly braked at all to do that kind of damage.

It's....offputting....to hear the police chief talk about how shaken up they are that one of their own was involved. I dunno - maybe it's just me, but I watched the interview with that guy this morning (also after hearing Andy reference it) and read the quotes and it just reads to me as them being worried about their guy.

I mean...your guy probably killed someone by being careless. Yeah, I'm jumping the gun a bit here, but it's hard to just drive through the back of someone if you're at 10 and 2 with your eyes on the road.

I come in from the East (and usually pretty early) so I don't see those traffic jams, but man - that could have been anybody just sitting there waiting for a ballgame. Brutal stuff.

1) It’s a night game, and cops have some of the highest rates of substance abuse of any profession.

2) I hope the PD either field tested the cop or there is zero evidence of intoxication. Because if any comes out, it’s going to look like a Thin Blue Line situation.

I drive a big truck at work and get a birds eye view of all of the distracted driving going on. This is no surprise, but it is constantly going on and police officers are frequent offenders along with every other demographic.

this is exactly why im constantly looking behind me, i don't even know how many times me jumping onto the shoulder has saved me from getting rear ended

Riding the motorcycle kinda trained me to do that. I had to put the bike on a shoulder once and the dude rear-ended the guy I was sitting behind. Your situational awareness on a bike has to be so high that it just bleeds into your day to day driving.

I'm not gonna say the guy was drunk or looking up porn on his phone or anything. I can't get to any kind of clear gross negligence here (yet). But if nothing else, there's an exceptionally high likelihood that this man simply not paying attention led directly to someone's death. I really don't need to hear the police chief acting more concerned about circling the badge right now.

Maybe save that for a different interview...

**** man, that really sucks. A child no less..

That accident happened 10 minutes in front of me. It was horrific to see what had happened to that car. It was an absolute no doubter that the driver did not make it.

RIP

If the cop was at fault they will sweep it under the rug like they shot someone

situations where police make mistakes never get followed up on they only get buried

sad that this happened to such a young soul

If this was the kid of a politico everyone would be on trail like the maintenance men at schlitterbahn

I hope this guy loses his job.

It was an accident but cops need to be held to a higher standard. On and off duty. This idiot just killed someone. Damn.

driving a work van while off duty

your tax dollars at work

FWIW, the Officer hey interviewed said that this is common practice since the officer involved was on call. He said that they wouldn’t want him to drive his civilian vehicle while on call, in case he does have to respond to something.

Not sure if he was going to the game or not. If he was, then he probably shouldn’t attend the game while on call. How exactly would he get to a call on time from a packed stadium?