Three people were killed in a serious collision near the southern Alberta village of Beiseker, EMS said on Friday.
The crash involved two vehicles on Highway 9 at Range Road 271, RCMP said in a news release. The incident was reported to police at around 10:11 a.m.
WATCH: Three people are dead after a collision just south of Beiseker, Alta., EMS confirmed on Friday morning. Lisa MacGregor reports.
RCMP said a man and woman in their 20s, who were travelling in the vehicle with a five-year-old child, were killed in the crash. A 69-year-old woman driving in the other vehicle was also killed in the crash.
The five-year-old girl was transported to Calgary via STARS Air Ambulance. Police say she suffered several broken bones and remained in serious condition as of 6:30 p.m. Investigators are still working to determine her relationship to those killed in the crash.
“Traffic is being diverted on Highway 9 between Kathryn and Irricana. Motorists are requested to avoid the area and seek alternate routes,” RCMP said. “The area is likely to be diverted for several hours.”
In August 2016, Jonathan Sobol and Alec Bracegirdle were killed in a head-on collision on the same highway.
RCMP spokesperson Cpl. Laurel Scott said Friday a collision reconstruction analyst was on the scene by 3 p.m. trying to determine what caused the deadly crash.
Scott could not say whether the collision happened in an area of the highway where passing was allowed.
“A collision like this requires an extremely thorough investigation,” she said. “We’re still investigating the cause of the collision, so it would be premature to make any speculation, and in terms of that stretch of highway, I don’t have information on that.”
Scott called the collision tragic.
“It’s a tragic day for the families, there’s a lot of people impacted by this collision,” she said.
“And we, at the RCMP, our hearts are broken. These collisions are hard for us to attend and hard to speak to. We just can’t imagine the pain that this is going to cause several families in Alberta.”
The highway was closed for some time, but was reopened for travel as of 6:30 p.m.
Beiseker is 74 kilometres northeast of Calgary.
More to come…
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