Woman driving wrong way on Saw Mill Parkway in Chappaqua crashes
CHAPPAQUA, N.Y. (WABC) -- A woman driving the wrong way on the Saw Mill Parkway in Chappaqua crashed into another vehicle, sending both drivers to the hospital.
Newscopter 7 was above the damage Friday morning and the highway was still shut down hours after the crash. The force of the collision was plain to see.
It was a head-on crash that police say was caused by a drunk driver.
It happened just after 1 a.m. on the Saw Mill River Parkway.
Police say a 22-year-old woman got on the highway's northbound lanes, driving southbound.
It wasn't long before other motorists took notice and called 911, but police couldn't get there fast enough to prevent the crash just south of route 120 in Chappaqua.
"It was only about three minutes between the time of the first call and the time of the accident, so we assume she was not on the parkway that long before the accident happened," said Inspector Thomas Gleason, of the Westchester County Police Department.
Police have charged Tess Keegan of Waccabuc in the town of Lewisboro with DWI, felony vehicular assault, and reckless driving.
Keegan's Kia slammed into a Toyota driven by an unidentified man from Connecticut, who had to be cut out his car.
The drivers of both vehicles were the only occupants and both were taken to Westchester Medical Center.
This is hardly the first wrong way crash on Westchester's parkways.
Five years ago, Diane Schuler killed herself and seven others on the Taconic State Parkway.
This past winter, an NYPD detective was killed on the Sprain Brook Parkway by a wrong way driver that police say was drunk.
Police actually have advice for anyone driving late on Westchester's narrow, winding parkways.
"If you do encounter anyone who is disoriented or impaired, driving the wrong way in your lane, chances are they are going to be in the left lane because they think they are in the right lane, so stay in the right lane is my advice to people traveling, especially at night on the parkways," Gleason said.
