Minnesota teen killed after hitting elk, getting struck by vehicle in Colorado
An 18-year-old woman from Minnesota was killed in a crash in Colorado early Monday after the SUV she was in hit an elk. She was then was struck by a passing vehicle.
Kendra Durnan of Buffalo, Minnesota, was in a vehicle that was traveling southbound on Interstate 25 near Castle Rock, Colorado, when they hit the elk that was apparently running across the highway, a Colorado State Patrol news release says.
The State Patrol was called to the vehicle-animal crash around 12:53 a.m. local time. When troopers arrived, they found a second crash had occurred involving multiple vehicles, resulting in nine people being injured and Durnan being killed.
Durnan was the passenger in a Chevy Trailblazer, driven by a 21-year-old Minnesota man. After hitting the Elk, they pulled onto the left shoulder and another vehicle stopped to offer help.
All three people were outside of their vehicles when a third vehicle, a Toyota 4Runner, hit the elk lying in the road. The 4Runner then went onto the shoulder, hitting Durnan, who was standing at the back of the Trailblazer, and the Trailblazer.
The crash sent Durnan and the two others over the concrete barrier into the northbound lanes.
The 4Runner then traveled back onto the road and was hit from behind by a Dodge Nitro, which rotated into the other lane and hit a Kia Forte.
The State Patrol says the driver and passenger in the 4Runner suffered serious and life-threatening injuries; there were four people in the Nitro — the driver and a 10-year-old girl suffered serious injuries, a 30-year-old passenger had unknown injuries and a 10-year-old boy wasn't injured; and the driver of the Forte suffered minor injuries.
The conditions of the two other people who were thrown over the concrete barrier were not released.
One of Durnan's friends set up a Go Fund Me page to help her family pay for funeral expenses and move her belongings from Colorado back to Minnesota.
According to social media posts, Durnan had recently moved to Colorado Springs and was a fashion model with Privileged Model Management based in Minneapolis.
