State police in region investigated 153 crashes on Labor Day weekend

State troopers in three local troops were busy during the Labor Day weekend as they investigated five fatalities in four crashes, including ones in Allegheny, Fayette and Westmoreland, according to statistics released by the agency.

That amounted to half of the fatalities on the roads statewide that were investigated by troopers.

Between Friday and Monday, troopers that cover all or parts of 13 counties in Southwestern Pennsylvania investigated 153 crashes that resulted in 64 injuries. Alcohol was a factor in 18 of the crashes, resulting in the death of one person.

Four people were killed in local crashes investigated by state police:

• William Earl Rager, 44, of Salem, died when his motorcycle hit wires on a utility pole Friday night on Route 119 in Salem, Westmoreland County. Rager lost control and hit a drainage culvert.

• Two people died and seven were injured early Sunday in Wharton, Fayette County, after a head-on crash on Route 40. The driver and a passenger of a vehicle that crossed the center line were killed, troopers said. They did not release their identities and said an interpreter was needed because all of the occupants in both vehicles were foreign national citizens and no one spoke English.

• Michael N. Zappone, 47, of Latrobe, was the passenger in a vehicle that hit an embankment late Monday on the Parkway East on-ramp from Route 30 in Wilkinsburg, Allegheny County.

Statewide, troopers investigated 671 crashes that resulted in 220 injuries, statistics showed. Alcohol was a factor in 61 of the crashes and resulted in two fatalities. The number of total crashes, fatal crashes, fatalities, injuries and alcohol-related crashes increased from 2022.

Locally, troopers made 128 arrests for impaired driving and wrote more than 1,500 speeding tickets. Across the Commonwealth, troopers made 514 impaired driving arrests and wrote more than 9,000 speeding tickets, about 1,000 more than in 2022.

PennDOT District 12 took part in a national crackdown during the Labor Day weekend in which message signs were placed along state roads advising motorists to “Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over.”

The signs were placed in areas that have seen a high number of crashes with impairment — including Route 30 at the intersection of Route 136, on the western edge of Greensburg, and Route 366 between New Kensington and Route 380.