Police investigating double fatal crash in Ontario County

Posted at: 09/19/2012 3:51 PM | Updated at: 09/20/2012 3:47 AM
By: Lynette Adams | WHEC.com

Ontario County Sheriff's investigators are trying to determine what caused a car to veer out of its lane into the path of an oncoming pickup truck. Two people were killed.

The crash happened around 2 p.m. on Route 21, just outside the Hamlet of Cheshire.

The Sheriff's office spent hours at the scene trying to determine what caused the crash. There was virtually nothing left of the car the two victims were riding in.

Lauri Steimer says she is so accustomed to hearing fender benders caused by motorists running through the stop sign on Route 21, that when she heard the sound of a crash Wednesday she didn't pay any attention. Then, she came out and saw the commotion and know something about this crash was different.

"What concerned me was when the news crews showed up. I thought the news crews have never been here before and  I didn't hear a helicopter, like Mercy Flight. I didn't hear that and that's what frightened me," Steimer says.

Ontario County Sheriff Phil Povero says the crash was different.

"This was an extremely violent collision and as a result of this horrific crash, there are two people deceased," Sheriff Povero says.

The driver of the red car, Patsy Garcia, a 45-year-old from Canandaigua, was killed along with her male passenger. The car collided with a pickup truck hauling a livestock trailer. The 69-year-old driver of that vehicle was walking around when emergency crews arrived.

"From the information we have, the car entered the southbound lane inexplicably at this time. We just don't have a reason exactly," Sheriff Povero tells News10NBC.

The sheriff says it looks like Garcia tried to swerve to avoid the truck, but to no avail.

Deputies say one of the two dogs in the car died. The other was taken to a nearby vet hospital.

It's all disturbing to Lauri and Ernie Steimer, especially after learning the truck driver was a family friend.

"It seems like we come back and there are more accidents. We missed this one, but yet we saw it, it's really terrible, really sad," Ernie Steimer says.

Police say the driver of the pickup suffered only minor injuries.

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