(Hot Springs County, WY) – A one-vehicle crash on US-20 BUS/WY-789, reported at 9:00 PM on Saturday, September 30th, resulted in one fatality and one injury.
The deceased has been identified as the passenger of the vehicle, 26-year-old Wyoming resident Kari Bowden, according the Wyoming Highway Patrol (WHP) preliminary report released on October 11th.
The report states the driver, who was not identified in the report, was headed southbound on US-20, and at approximately milepost 128 the driver swerved to the left to avoid a deer in the roadway.
The driver overcorrected to the right causing the vehicle to enter a driver’s side leading slide.
The passenger side of the vehicle collided with the west guardrail before deflecting back into the paved shoulder, and colliding with the west guardrail again.
During this initial collision, the female passenger was ejected through the passenger side window.
The vehicle then crossed the highway, striking and deflecting off of the east guardrail, crossing the highway again, and striking the west guardrail where it traveled down before coming to rest.
The report states seatbelts were not in use, and driver speed is also being investigated as a potential contributing factor.
To date, there have been 88 fatalities on Wyoming’s roadways in 2021, compared to 105 in 2020, 128 in 2019, and 92 in 2018.