1 dead and 2 seriously injured in plane crash in Bartholomew County

BARTHOLOMEW COUNTY, Ind. – A woman was killed and two other people were seriously injured in a two-car crash in rural Bartholomew County Tuesday afternoon.

The accident was reported shortly after 4 p.m. on July 2 at the intersection of East 100 South and South 525 East, about nine kilometers east of downtown Columbus.

When Bartholomew County Sheriff’s officers arrived, they found a sedan and a pickup truck with extensive damage. A total of three people were trapped in the vehicles.

Both the truck driver, a 21-year-old man from Bedford, and a passenger in the sedan, a 47-year-old man from Greensburg, were flown to Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis. The sheriff’s department said in a statement that the truck driver suffered “significant injuries” and the sedan passenger suffered “serious injuries.”

The driver of the sedan, identified by police as 51-year-old Tonya Whiteside of Greensburg, was pronounced dead at the scene.

“At this time, the preliminary investigation indicates that the (sedan) disregarded a stop sign at the intersection and entered the intersection, resulting in a collision,” the sheriff’s department said in a statement on social media, adding that drugs and alcohol were not believed to be factors in the crash.

The Bartholomew County Accident Reconstruction Team is investigating the incident.