Car flips, pins driver in Galax

Police are not sure what caused single-vehicle crash Oct. 9.

By SHAINA STOCKTON
Staff

While traveling north on Chestnut Drive in Galax last Tuesday afternoon, a woman was involved in an accident that resulted in her car flipping over and pinning her inside.
Galax Police Chief Rick Clark identified the driver as Betty Jo Smith, 74.
Smith was reportedly on her way to pick up her grandson from school when the accident happened, according to Galax Fire Chief David Hankley.
The Galax Volunteer Fire Department, Galax police and an off-duty police officer assisted at the scene of the accident. The off-duty officer was reportedly behind the vehicle when the crash took place, and he remained on the scene until others arrived.
There is no determined cause for the accident, said Hankley, but he did know the series of events that led to the crash. Smith drifted towards the right edge of the road, overcorrected and sped up an embankment on the left side, causing the car to flip.
Hankley said that Smith was not wearing a seatbelt at the time of the crash, which caused her to partially eject through the passenger window of the car. As a result, she suffered upper body and head injuries. She was semi-conscious when police and firefighters arrived at the scene.
The car was manually lifted, and chock blocks were placed underneath to hold the vehicle in place while Smith was extracted from the wreckage.
“If she had been wearing a seatbelt, I believe that she could have walked away from the accident,” Hankley said.
After she was freed from the car, Smith was taken to Twin County Regional Hospital’s emergency room, then flown to Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem, N.C.
There were no further details on her condition as of Friday afternoon.