BELLEVUE, Wash. — A motorcyclist was killed Friday morning by a wrong-way driver on State Route 520 in Bellevue, troopers said.
The crash happened in the eastbound lanes of SR 520, just west of Bellevue Way Northeast.
The investigation blocked all eastbound lanes, and they reopened shortly after 2 p.m.
A pickup truck was traveling the wrong way when it struck a motorcycle, troopers said.
The blue truck came to rest along a retaining wall after other drivers frantically called 911 to report the driver was heading west in the eastbound lanes.
‘We were trying to get there as quickly as we could," Trooper Rick Johnson said. "But unfortunately we couldn't get there before tragedy struck."
He said the driver, a 79-year-old man from Issaquah, managed to avoid other vehicles. But just after 11 a.m. Friday morning he trooper said he struck the motorcyclist, killing him instantly.
It happened around a curve, but Johnson could not say whether that played a role.
The motorcyclist's identity hasn't been released.
The wrong way driver was admitted to Overlake Hospital in Bellevue in satisfactory condition.
Investigators want to know whether he suffered a medical emergency that led to him going the wrong way on this highway.
Johnson said the driver of the pickup truck is an elderly man, who is cooperating with the investigation.
KIRO 7 dug into the Washington State Department of Transportation's public data portal online to look at data on crashes on state highways and freeways in King County.
In 2019, so far there have been 86 crashes on all King County roads. Thirteen of the 86 have been fatal.
There have been 158 fatal and serious injury collision on King County roads this year.
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