One person was taken to Newman Regional Health for medical treatment after a two-vehicle crash on Emporia’s north edge Thursday afternoon.
Emporia Fire, Emporia Police and the Kansas Highway Patrol all responded to Interstate 35 mile marker 129 southbound, about a mile west of the Merchant Street exit, shortly after 4 pm. An SUV apparently rear-ended a passenger car, which started smoking after impact. The Highway Patrol says the car, driven by 19-year-old Jocelyn Castillo of Emporia, was trying to merge into traffic from the southbound Merchant Street onramp. At the same time, an SUV driven by Denise Klopfenstein of Galien, Michigan, was southbound and got into slower traffic. Klopfenstein had to swing to the right to avoid that traffic, but as she did so she rear-ended Castillo’s car.
Castillo went to the hospital afterward for suspected minor injuries. Klopfenstein was not hurt.
Shortly before 6 pm, Emporia Fire and Highway Patrol troopers went to Kansas Turnpike mile marker 134 northbound, seven miles northeast of the Emporia tollgate, after a car hydroplaned during a thunderstorm and hit a guardrail twice. Initially called out as an injury wreck, Harmon says nobody went to a hospital afterward.
