Richard Payne, former owner of Dorian Greek House Restaurant in downtown Kamloops, remains in hospital in a medically induced coma following an accident in November.

Payne’s daughter said he is facing at least a year’s worth of recovery and rehabilitation.

Brandy Hunt said her 57-year-old dad had a heart attack on the evening of Nov. 1 as he was driving home from work.

His PT Cruiser was headed east on the Trans-Canada Highway and, just as he drove under the Yellowhead Highway overpass, the attack came and his car hit the concrete abutment in the middle of the highway.

From there, it flipped, landing on the driver’s side and leaving Payne with many broken bones, including his femur, tibia, fibula, pelvis, two vertebrae — “and anywhere where the seatbelt was,” Hunt said.

Both front and back ribs were broken and his lungs were punctured.

Payne’s spinal cord was not damaged by the accident.

After a lengthy stay in the intensive-care unit at Royal Inland Hospital, Payne was moved to a ward earlier this month, but stopped breathing and was taken back to the ICU and put into the coma as doctors continue trying to determine what’s going on inside his body.

Because of all the broken bones, Payne has been kept immobile, leading to pneumonia and blood clots.

He also has a tracheotomy to help him breathe.

Since the accident, Hunt said, her parents have sold the restaurant back to its former owners, Jim and Diane Dokolas.

“It was too much for my mother to handle,” Hunt said. “She’s been pretty much always by his side in the hospital since the accident.”

Payne and his wife Laura, longtime customers of the restaurant, bought it in 2014.

The restaurant was her father’s life, Hunt said, its staff like his family.

“He’s going to miss the people there. He loved his work.”

Hunt praised RIH staff caring for her father.

“This is my first experience with someone in a bad accident and they work so hard there,” she said.

UPDATE: Six vehicles were involved in the accident, with one person taken to Royal Inland Hospital in serious condition and others treated at the hospital for less severe injuries. The crash was a result of a head-on collision and closed the stretch of highway for a few hours. The investigation continues. Single-lane traffic is being allowed through in both directions as of 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday

An Idealease truck hangs off the edge of Highway 5 North between Sun Rivers and Mount Paul Way following a multi-vehicle crash on Tuesday morning. The truck and the two cars in the photo were involved in the collision, as were two vehicles not in the photo. There are serious injuries reported.
Andrea Klassen/KTW

Kamloops Rural RCMP are at the scene of a major accident on Highway 5 North, between Sun Rivers and Mt. Paul Way.

As of 9:30 a.m., the highway has been shut down in both directions. Police said they hoped to have the stretch re-opened by 2 p.m.

Motorists were advised to avoid the area and use alternate routes through the city to access Highway 5 North.

More to come . . .

An Idealease truck hangs off the edge of Highway 5 North between Sun Rivers and Mount Paul Way following a multi-vehicle crash on Tuesday morning.
Andrea Klassen/KTW

One person was taken to Royal Inland Hospital with life-threatening injuries following a multi-vehicle accident that closed Highway 5 North between Sun Rivers and Mount Paul Way for five hours.

Kamloops RCMP Sgt. Mike Pears said a southbound car with one occupant lost control and crashed head-on with a northbound cube van carrying two people.

Pears said the collision forced the cube van into the southbound lane, where it crashed into a southbound Chevrolet pickup truck that was pulling a cargo trailer. The driver of the pickup truck was not wearing a seatbelt and was rushed to the hospital with life-threatening injuries.

Pears said six vehicles were involved in the accident — three directly and three that came into contact with debris as a result of the crash.

The Central Interior Traffic Services Unit in Kamloops is looking for anyone who witnessed this collision who has not spoken to police. The unit can be reached at 250-828-3159.

The accident has prompted Mounties to remind drivers to slow down in winter conditions, to leave room between their vehicle and the vehicle ahead, to not get distracted to stay off cellphones and pay attention to driving and to wear seatbelts.

Canadian National Rail has confirmed that its yard in Kamloops was the site of a diesel spill on Christmas Day.

Kate Fenske, manager of media and community relations for CN, told KTW 7,000 litres of diesel fuel spilled onto the ground as it was being transferred from a rail car to a contractor’s vehicle.

Fenske said no diesel entered any waterways and the entire volume was contained and cleaned up at the spot where it spilled.

She added there were no injuries sustained by employees of CN or the contractor, Sands Bulk Transport of Prince George.

KTW has left a message with Sands.

Fenske said the B.C. Ministry of Environment and Environment Canada were notified of the spill.

The CN yard is located on the west side of Highway 5N just before Rayleigh.

One man is in custody after fleeing the scene of an accident on Westsyde Road on Saturday afternoon.

The individual, who was driving an SUV north, crossed into the oncoming lane and collided with a south-bound vehicle.

The lone occupant of the south-bound vehicle was taken to Royal Inland Hospital with non-life threatening injuries.

But following the collision, the driver of the north-bound vehicle fled the scene prior to the arrival of police, travelling to the area around Oak Hills Boulevard. An RCMP police dog service team was used to track the man, who was located and apprehended as he tried to leave the area in a taxi.

The 30-year-old Kamloops resident has been arrested for dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing bodily harm and failing to remain at the scene of an accident.

Mounties are investigating is drugs and/or alcohol contributed to the collision.

Kamloops Mounties are investigating a two-vehicle collision that occurred in the 1700-block of Westsyde Rd at just before 8 p.m. on Monday.

Preliminary investigation has determined a southbound vehicle lost control and crossed into the northbound lane, colliding with a northbound vehicle. The driver and lone occupant of the southbound vehicle has been taken to Royal Inland Hospital with what are suspected to be critical injuries. The driver and lone occupant of the northbound vehicle did not suffer injuries of note.

Westsyde Road was closed in the 1700-block, with traffic able to bypass the closed section using Collingwood Drive.

The investigation continues.

UPDATE: Kamloops RCMP say the public’s help aided in finding the suspect vehicle involved in the hit-and-run incident — a pickup truck — a short distance from the accident scene. No word yet on whether the driver has been found.

A hit-and-run incident in Sahali on Tuesday night sent a man to the hospital and has Kamloops Mounties searching for a driver who fled the scene.

RCMP Sgt. Darren Michels said the accident took place at Summit and Waddington drives at about 5:30 p.m.

The male driver of a vehicle was taken to Royal Inland Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, while the driver of the second vehicle, believed to be a grey- or champagne-coloured GMC/Chevrolet pickup truck, took off before police arrived.
Michels said the suspect vehicle will likely have front-end damage.

As of 6 p.m., traffic in the area remained backed up and motorists are advised to avoid using the route for at least a couple of hours.
Anybody with information on the incident is asked to call Kamloops RCMP at 250-828-3000.

Brayden Caverly collects personal belongings from his sister Brenna’s vehicle after one of several early morning motor vehicle incidents along the Trans-Canada Highway 1 near the Pineview Golf Course in Dallas. Brenna, a School District 73 employee, was heading to work around 7 a.m. when the accident occurred. She was uninjured in the rollover. A kilometre or so further east, a Jeep also left the highway and landed down a steep embankment.  Dave Eagles/Kamloops This Week

KTW reader Breanna Turmel sent these photos in as she came across an accident on Highway 1 in Dallas, near Pineridge Golf Course.

Traffic westbound was backed up at about 8:30 a.m. when a semi-truck left the highway, possibly due to black ice.

A Greyhound bus that left Kamloops for Prince George on Thursday morning crashed near Hixon, a small community between Quesnel and Prince George.

Latest reports say nine passengers have been taken to hospital, three with serious, but non-life-threatening, injuries.

The bus and the trailer it was towing left snowy Highway 97 and flipped on its side at about 8 a.m.

Officers attended the scene on Woodpecker Hill, about 38 kilometres south of Prince George.

A joint investigative team; RCMP traffic Services analyst, a reconstructionist  and a commercial vehicle safety inspector are on scene attempting to determine exactly what caused the bus to leave the road.

An investigation continues following a fatal accident on Sunday on Highway 5, south of McLure.

Emergency personnel from Barriere and Kamloops were called to the crash scene at 1 p.m.

Police say southbound Chevrolet Lumina lost control on wet, slushy winter roads and crossed into the path of a northbound commercial tractor-trailer unit.

The driver and lone occupant in the car, a Clearwater-area man in his 40s, died at the scene.

“This is a tragic incident that reminds everyone how people’s and families lives can change in an instant as the result of a motor-vehicle collision,” said Kamloops RCMP Sgt. Mike Pears.

“The RCMP are reminding motorists to slow down on winter roads, make sure you have good winter tires and be prepared for anything as you travel.”

The B.C. Coroners Service has confirmed the identity of a man who died in a Highway 5N crash in McLure on Jan. 17.

Antonino George (Tony) Cuthbert, 48, of Clearwater, was the driver and sole occupant of a car that was involved in a collision with a semi-trailer on the highway about 48 kilometres north of Kamloops.

The accident occurred at about 1 p.m.

The B.C. Coroners Service and RCMP continue to investigate the death.

A man is in hospital after what police are describing as a high-speed crash on Highland Drive.

Kamloops RCMP Staff Sgt. Edward Preto said emergency crews were called to the road, which links Juniper Heights with the Trans-Canada Highway in Valleyview, just after 2 a.m. on Tuesday.

“A pickup truck lost control and then rolled over,” he said, noting the driver, the vehicle’s sole occupant, was injured in the crash.

“He was transported to Royal Inland Hospital for treatment.”

Preto said investigators believe the vehicle lost control while travelling at a high rate of speed, crashing through a concrete barrier.

The investigation is ongoing.

Five snowmobilers died Friday in a major avalanche near McBride, about 400 kilometres north of Kamloops, which came as “heartbreaking news” to the snowmobiling community and local officials.

The slide happened in the Renshaw area east of McBride, which is about 210 kilometres southeast of Prince George. RCMP said three separate groups of snowmobilers were in the area at the time.

Mounties said they were first notified after the activations of two separate GPS beacons, which are carried by backcountry enthusiasts in case of emergency. The Robson Valley Search and Rescue Team was immediately activated.

One helicopter was dispatched and two search and rescue technicians were on scene almost immediately as they were snowmobiling in the area just before the slide, said Cpl. Dan Moskaluk.

“They quickly determined there were several persons that were buried,” he said. “Unfortunately, five snowmobilers are deceased as a result of the avalanche. Their remains have been recovered from the avalanche area.”

Throughout the afternoon and evening, rescue crews and paramedics helped to remove people from the area and tend to the injured, he said.

Three ground ambulances were sent to the scene and one person was transported to hospital in stable condition, the B.C. Ambulance Service said.

Authorities weren’t able to confirm Friday night that everyone had been accounted for. Local RCMP were visiting motels and making inquiries in the community to see if anyone was missing, Moskaluk said.

At least eight snowmobiles were buried in the slide, he added.

The B.C. Coroners Service said two coroners had been dispatched from Prince George.

Rick Thompson, a councillor with the Village of McBride, described the area on Mount Renshaw as a popular sledding area about 15 kilometres from the townsite and said the news came as a shock.

“It’s devastating. As soon as you hear about something this tragic, you immediately begin to think about all your friends and family that you know and the acquaintances you do know who may be out there sledding,” he said.

“I was out at Chinese dinner this evening when the news broke and it was like, ‘Oh my God, who was out there?”’

Thompson said a contributing factor was doubtless the weather, which he described as “not terrific.”

“We had a great amount of rain down in the valley early in the week, which meant there was a lot of fresh snow, about three feet I heard, up on the mountain. It’s been hot and cold, which creates poor conditions, so avalanche conditions are high.”

The news prompted an outpouring of condolences from avid snowmobilers.

“This is truly heartbreaking news,” a member of a snowmobiling community forum wrote. “It feels, when hearing news of other snowmobilers passing, like losing a family member. Never met these folks, but I am sad to have lost them.”

Karl Klassen of Avalanche Canada said the “very large, significant” avalanche appears to be human-triggered, but he did not elaborate.

He said rain and snow over the last few days followed by clearing and cooling on Friday may have produced stresses in the snowpack.

Two men were also killed in the McBride area in March 2015.

They were part of a group of four Albertans who had been snowmobiling in the Dore River Basin near the community.

Curtis Fries, 36, of Sherwood Park, Alta., was dug out of the snow and his fellow riders tried to perform CPR on him, but he died at the scene. Thomas Hamilton, 29, of Ponoka, Alta., was later found under 15 feet of snow.

— The Canadian Press

The light snowfall in Kamloops on Monday morning led to slick streets and this crash in the 800-block of Columbia Street. The driver of this vehicle slid off the main thoroughfare and drove through Tarcisio Trotta’s yard on the south side of Columbia before crossing the busy street and crashing through rocks and a fence and coming to rest in the front yard of a home on the north side of the street. Trotta said the out-of-control vehicle missed his parked car by inches. There were no serious injuries reported.
Andrea Klassen/KTW

A 61-year-old Kamloops man has died following a serious crash on Highway 5 North near Sun Rivers in December.

BC Coroners Service spokeswoman Barb McLintock told KTW Wesley Earl Peters died in Royal Inland Hospital on Jan. 28 as a result of complications from injuries he suffered in the Dec. 29 wreck.

The crash between Shuswap Road and Mount Paul Way closed the highway for five hours.

Police said at the time the driver of a southbound car lost control and collided head-on with a northbound cube van, which then collided with a pickup truck.

The driver of the pickup truck was not wearing a seatbelt and was rushed to hospital with life-threatening injuries.

The police investigation is ongoing.

Police say alcohol and speed were likely contributors to an accident Sunday that sent five people from the Lower Mainland to hospitals in Kamloops and Merritt with serious injuries.

RCMP Sgt. Mike Pears of the Central Interior Traffic Service said the single-vehicle crash of the Honda Civic occurred at 1 a.m. on Sunday on the Coquihalla Highway near the Mine Creek exit.

Merritt RCMP and Central Interior Traffic Services continue to investigate.

“Alcohol and speed appear to be factors in this collision,” Pears said. “ It is fortunate that no other vehicles were involved in this incident.”

Police continue to investigate a collision on Highway 1 near Chase on Saturday that claimed the life of a motorcyclist.

Chase RCMP Const. Valerie Guillaume said the crash took place at 9:30 a.m. one kilometre east of Chase when a westbound semi tractor-trailer was struck head-on by an eastbound motorcycle after it crossed the double solid yellow lines dividing the lanes of the highway.

The driver of the motorcycle died instantly, while the truck driver was not seriously injured.

The BC Coroners Service has confirmed the identity of a man who died in an accident on Highway 1 in Chase on Feb. 6.

Austin Logan Schmidt, 19, of Chase died instantly when the dirt bike he was driving crossed the centre line and collided head-on with a semi-trailer at about 9:30 a.m.

The BC Coroners Service and RCMP continue to investigate this death.

The driver of a pickup truck was lucky to escape injury after a crash on the Yellowhead Highway near Sun Rivers on Wednesday night.

Emergency crews were called to Highway 5 on the north side of the South Thompson River Bridge just after 9 p.m. for a reported collision.

Investigators determined a pickup truck and a semi travelling south on the highway collided when the pickup drifted into the next lane.

“This caused the pickup truck to skid to the right and it spun across the oncoming lanes coming to rest perched on the steep embankment overlooking the Tk’emlups Powwow Grounds,” RCMP Staff Sgt. Doug Aird said, noting there was no northbound traffic in the area at the time.

“Fortunately, there were no injuries in the mishap and only minor damage was caused to both vehicles.”

Traffic on the highway was impacted for a short time.

Aird said the driver of the pickup was issued a ticket for making an unsafe lane change.

Two teenagers were taken to Royal Inland Hospital on Friday evening after being struck by a vehicle while they were walking in a marked crosswalk on Westsyde Road.

The teenagers, a boy and girl both 17 years of age, suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

Kamloops RCMP Cpl. Stephen Newport said the teens were crossing Westsyde Road at Overlander Drive in a crosswalk at about 6:45 p.m. when they were hit.

He said the driver stayed at the scene and is co-operating with police. Alcohol is not believed to be a factor in the accident.

Kamloops RCMP Traffic Services are continuing to investigate.