Caldwell motorcyclist killed in collision at South Montana Ave. and East Ustick Road
A motorcyclist was killed Wednesday in a collision with a Subaru Impreza at the intersection of East Ustick Road and South Montana Avenue, according to the Idaho State Police.
The Subaru driver, traveling north on South Montana at 1:26 p.m., stopped at a stop sign but started again before the motorcyclist, a 44-year-old Caldwell man, traveled through the intersection, said Nathan Madenford, manager of Idaho’s Collision Reconstruction Program. There’s no evidence to suggest the Subaru driver was intoxicated, he said, but the crash was under investigation.
The motorcyclist died at the scene. He was wearing a helmet, according to a state police newsrelease.
The first priority for investigating such crashes, Madenford said, is collecting fleeting evidence and information from the scene. That could include identifying skid marks, determining whether the driver was impaired and talking to any passengers or witnesses.
It also means recognizing when there’s a lack of evidence on site, he said, and walking farther from the scene to see if there are any clues investigators missed. Those could include potholes, evidence that a car drifted into the dirt next to the road before the crash, or tire tread separated from a tire.
“We’re trying to figure out what are all of the possibilities of what could have happened and see if we can gather the evidence or lack of evidence as to that,” Madenford said.
Most of the evidence is gathered the same day of the crash, he said. But it takes time to build the complete picture.
Investigators must wait for the results of autopsies in fatal crashes, plus toxicology reports if blood was drawn from the people involved. Forensic measurements taken at the scene of the wreck are translated into scale diagrams used to make calculations about the collision.
Then comes the math. A reconstructionist uses the data available from the investigation to calculate vehicles’ speed, momentum and the timing of the crash.
All told, investigations can last three to six months, Madenford said. Once one is completed, the program reviews the results with county prosecutors, taking into account all possible factors before pressing charges — including the speed of the motorcycle and impact of any road construction in Wednesday’s scenario, for example.
“There’s so many variables in a simple crash,” he said.
Prosecutors ultimately determine whether to press charges.
