DIXFIELD — An Avon woman escaped injury Wednesday afternoon when police say she apparently passed out due to a medical emergency while driving west on U.S. Route 2.
The 2002 Ford van driven by Paula L. Viles, 47, traveled a few hundred feet through a rock-strewn drainage ditch and onto a snowmobile trail before stopping short of some trees, Dixfield police Chief Richard A. Pickett said at the scene.
Pickett said Viles apparently suffered a low blood-sugar diabetic attack at 3:14 p.m. and passed out while rounding a curve near the Porter Road.
“There was no sign of braking,” he said, indicating where the van left the road and entered the ditch. The ditch is in front of a slope covered with large stones to prevent erosion.
“If she passed out and her foot depressed the gas pedal, and if the right front wheel hadn’t have been nearly torn off, the van would have continued into the woods,” Pickett said.
After reviewing evidence, he said the van traveled about 125 feet through the drainage ditch, then went into the larger stones on the slope.
“She probably went airborne in these rocks,” Pickett said.
The van flew over a dirt side road and traveled another 75 feet or more, dragging the extensively-damaged front end, he said.
“There was no airbag deployment,” he said, marveling that Viles wasn’t injured.
Dixfield firefighters directed traffic around the scene and checked the vehicle for leaking fluids while a Med-Care Ambulance crew tended to Viles inside the ambulance.
“She has no recollection of being here,” Pickett said after talking with her.
He said Viles, who was driving a van owned by Work First Inc. of Farmington, had dropped a client off earlier in New Sharon and wasn’t supposed to be driving in Dixfield afterward.
Pickett estimated damage to the van at between $4,000 and $4,500.
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- Paula Viles of Avon, the driver of the van, apparently passed out due to a diabetic issue while rounding a curve on Route 2 in Dixfield on Wednesday, police said. She was not injured.
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- A Med-Care Ambulance crew and Dixfield police Chief Richard A. Pickett talk with Paula Viles of Avon, who passed out behind the wheel of the van, background, on Route 2 on Wednesday afternoon. The van traveled a few hundred feet through this rock-strewn drainage ditch before stopping on a snowmobile trail.
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- Dixfield police Chief Richard A. Pickett talks on his phone with Work First Inc. of Farmington, the owner of a 2002 Ford van and employer of its driver who suffered a medical emergency Wednesday afternoon on Route 2.
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