photo by: Derek Redd

Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a fatal crash on Interstate 70 near The Highlands on Thursday night.

The names of the three people killed Thursday night in a three-vehicle crash were released Friday afternoon by the Ohio County Sheriff’s Office.

Driver Bobby Tidrick, 23, and passengers Earl Safreed Jr., 32, and Stella Safreed, 27, all were killed when their vehicle crossed the median while driving east on Interstate 70 near the Highlands, striking another vehicle and colliding with a tractor trailer.

The drivers of the other two vehicles were taken to WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital for possible injuries. The crash remains under investigation.

Original story

TRIADELPHIA — A three-vehicle crash Thursday night on Interstate 70 West near The Highlands killed three and closed both lanes of I-70 West for hours.

Ohio County Sheriff Tom Howard said a vehicle traveling east on I-70 lost control and crossed the median into westbound traffic. That vehicle collided with another, then hit a tractor trailer head-on.

Three people in the car that crossed the median were killed, Howard said. The driver of the tractor trailer was taken to WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital as a precaution, as were an adult and a child in the third vehicle. Howard said those three didn’t seem to be seriously injured.

I-70 West reopened shortly before midnight.

The names of those involved in the crash had not been released as of Thursday night.

Authorities were diverting traffic off of I-70 West at the Dallas Pike exit for several hours Thursday night as law enforcement, firefighters and emergency personnel were tending to the crash site.

Thursday’s crash led Howard to reiterate his call to install a cable in the median of that section of Interstate 70. He said he had been calling for that measure since he first was elected sheriff.

“All I can think of is that, if that cable were there, that car wouldn’t have crossed the median,” Howard said.