Two people died and another person suffered critical injuries early Saturday when a CHP chase ended with a Kia slamming into a brick column in North Tustin, overturning and catching on fire.
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The chase began on the northbound 55 freeway, north of Dyer Road, where the silver Kia Sol was spotted exceeding speeds of 90 mph, according to the California Highway Patrol. The pursuit went from the freeway to the 17th Street exit and then in the direction of Newport Avenue, where the driver lost control of the car, the CHP said.
After crashing into the brick column, the Kia overturned several times before catching on fire, said the CHP, whose officers were able to pull one male passenger out of the vehicle but the other two passengers died on impact.
Paramedics were sent to the scene just after 2 a.m., when the man in his early 20s was rushed to Western Medical Center in Santa Ana, where he was listed in critical condition, according to the Orange County Fire Authority.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.