Less than 45 minutes separated two car collisions at the corner of Iowa Avenue and South Center Street late Thursday morning.
Police said the crashes are unrelated.
The first crash occurred just before 11:30 a.m. Sgt. Chris Roush, of the Marshalltown Police Department, said a man in his 50s or 60s failed to yield when turning east onto Iowa Avenue when a teenaged girl, heading north on Center Street, smashed into his car.
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T-R PHOTO BY DAVID ALEXANDER
Marshalltown Fire and Police along with assistance from Marshalltown Area Paramedic Service tend to victims of a two-vehicle car crash at the intersection of South Center Street and Iowa Avenue late Thursday morning. This was the second of two collisions at the same intersection within 45 minutes.
The crash likely totaled the girl's car and left significant damage to the man's car.
Roush said the light was green for both drivers.
"The fact that they are not dead is an indicator that they weren't speeding," he said.
That stretch of road has 45 mph speed limit, but Roush said getting up to that speed in noon-hour traffic can often be difficult.
Paramedics transported the man to Marshalltown Medical & Surgical Center. Roush said he was unaware of how badly the man was hurt, but said he was alert and talking when EMTs transported him.
Officer Bradley Mauseth didn't get a chance to leave the scene before the second collision occurred.
The second crash, more minor than the first, involved two other cars, Mauseth said. A woman driving a station wagon north on Center Street cut off a man driving a van heading south on Center Street when she went to turn east onto Iowa Avenue.
"I tried to avoid her," Hank Bradbury, the driver of the van, said.
His swerving caused him to clip the back of a Grand Prix with five young men in it. Witnesses testimonies corroborated Bradbury's story, Mauseth said.
"Another two feet and I could have avoided him," Bradbury said.
He said that he couldn't have been driving more than 10 mph when he collided with the Grand Prix because his airbag didn't deploy, which does so at 11 mph.
Both cars were able to be driven from the scene. Mauseth said all those involved declined medical treatment. At the scene, he said he was unsure whether police would cite the driver of the station wagon for cutting Bradbury off.