The SUV involved in the wrong-way crash Saturday morning that killed two people on Route 28 entered the highway from Anderson Street on Pittsburgh’s North Shore before it crashed into another vehicle traveling south on the highway near the East Ohio Street exit, Pittsburgh Public Safety spokeswoman Cara Cruz said.
The city’s Collision Investigation Unit used video and evidence at the scene to determine how the Lincoln SUV ended up traveling the wrong way on the highway, Cruz said.
Carlos Burley, 31, of Pittsburgh, was the driver of the Lincoln that crashed into a Ford SUV, according to the Allegheny County Medical Examiner’s office.
When police arrived at about 7:15 a.m., they found the Lincoln in flames and Burley was dead.
A passenger in the Ford also died in the crash. She was identified as Kapinga Madeleine Mulumba, 45, of Pittsburgh, by the Allegheny County Medical Examiner’s office.
The driver of the Ford, traveling with Mulumba, hasn’t been identified. He was taken to a hospital in critical condition. An update on his condition wasn’t released Monday.
“We are not privy to a patient’s condition once they are admitted to the hospital,” Cruz said.
Anderson Street is the short stretch of road that extends from the Rachel Carson Bridge to near Cedar Avenue on the North Side. An exit ramp from southbound Route 28 ends on Anderson Street, next to an access point for the HOV lane of Interstate 279.
It is the second fatal wrong-way crash in the region since October, when there was a similar crash on I-279 North near Chestnut Street in Pittsburgh.
PennDOT doesn’t track wrong-way crashes, but does review specific crashes when police provide a report, spokesman Steve Cowan said.
“Our PennDOT district has made a number of signing and pavement marking improvements to alert motorists that they are entering the ramp in the wrong direction on our limited access highways in an effort to eliminate these head-on crashes,” Cowan said.
These signs include oversized, double “One Way/Do Not Enter” and double “Wrong Way” signs and “Wrong Way” markings on the pavement, Cowan said.
