WINONA, Minn. – Bad judgment in passing on County Road 17 may have led to a three-car pile-up outside Winona on State Highway 17 halfway to Witoka. Two persons were taken to the Winona hospital with non-life threatening injuries. Sheriff’s officers pieced together this sequence of what happened:
> A slower driver – in Car A – had four vehicles queued behind. Call them B, C, D and E.
> The back-most driver, in Car E, pulled out to pass everybody but realized there wasn’t enough room to make it so darted back in ahead of Cars C and D.
> The oncoming car in opposite lane went by safely.
> Seeing a new opportunity to to get ahead of everybody, Driver E pulled out again, this time to pass Cars B and A.
> At this point something went seriously awry. Ether Driver E clipped Drive B or Driver B pulled out also to pass and sideswiped Car E, which already was in the process of passing.
> Either way,both Cars A and B went into the ditch and overturned.
This was about 3:35 p.m. near the Sheltered Drive entrance to County Road 17. It’s a long straight stretch but only two lanes. No citations were issued pending a further reconstruction of what happened, deputies said. Witnesses reported that Driver E had been speeding in the 50 mph zone and was passing erratically. This story doesn’t end there. The ambulance carrying one driver to the hospital was involved in a new collision inside the U.S. Highway 61 round about at Mankato Avenue — two block short of the Winona hospital. These drivers quickly exchanged insurance information, and soon the injured person from the County Road 17 accident, a Houston teenager, was in the emergency room being checked over. .