MERRIMACK –– A single-vehicle crash on the F.E. Everett Turnpike Southbound between Exit 12 and Exit 11 early Sunday morning left a family of four stranded in the woods.
Merrimack Fire Rescue, police and New Hampshire State Police responded to the incident after receiving a report of a vehicle rollover.
Dispatchers reported that the vehicle had veered approximately 25 feet off the road into a tree line. The vehicle was carrying two adults and two young children.
An additional ambulance was dispatched due to the number of people involved, and availability of a medical helicopter was checked.
Merrimack police arrived on the scene around 2:50 a.m. and found a man, a woman and two children — one approximately 4 years old and the other less than a year old.
All passengers had managed to exit the vehicle.
The woman was immediately transported by Merrimack Fire ambulance to a local hospital with what appeared to be non-life-threatening injuries.
The man and the two children were evaluated by firefighters in another ambulance at the scene.
After a period of time, the man refused medical transport for himself and the children.
Firefighters collected the car seats from the vehicle and assisted in transferring them to another car, where the children were then placed.
Preliminary information gathered at the scene indicates that the vehicle, a Lexus, had struck a Jersey barrier in the high-speed lane.
The car then careened off the barrier and down the right side of the road, hitting a large cement pipe and narrowly missing a utility pole before coming to rest in the woods.
