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OREM — A 26-year-old Provo woman has been identified as the person killed in a wrong-way crash involving a Utah Highway Patrol trooper over the weekend.
Natalie Munchgesang was killed when she collided head-on with trooper Carlos Rios-Redd.
Just before 2 a.m. Sunday, emergency dispatchers received a report of a car traveling north in the southbound lanes of I-15 in Utah County.
"As trooper Rios-Redd was traveling southbound on I-15, before any additional information could be gathered or broadcast to him, the trooper's vehicle and the wrong-way vehicle collided head-on," according to a statement from the Utah Highway Patrol.
Trooper Ben Fagan was close behind and first to arrive on scene after the crash. He saw that his fellow trooper's patrol car was on fire.
"Trooper Fagan broke out the driver's window in an attempt to extricate trooper Rios-Redd from the patrol car. The fire was growing and trooper Fagan retrieved an extinguisher to subdue the fire. The troopers were able to eventually get the car door open and trooper Fagan removed trooper Rios-Redd and moved him to a safer location," according to the department.
Munchgesang was pronounced dead at the scene. A woman who was a passenger in the vehicle was taken to a local hospital in critical condition. Rios-Redd was transported in serious condition. Gov. Spencer Cox tweeted on Sunday that Rios-Redd suffered a broken femur.
The southbound lanes of I-15 were closed in the area for seven to eight hours as the crash was investigated. Because the incident resulted in a death, officer-involved critical incident protocol was invoked. The fatal incident will be investigated by the Utah County Critical Incident Team. Whether Rios-Redd intentionally hit Munchgesang head-on or by happenstance will be part of the investigation.
