Fort Worth officer’s car rear-ended as he stopped to help motorist on I-30

A police officer and a car passenger were hospitalized Tuesday night after a motorist crashed into the officer’s patrol car and another vehicle at an exit off Interstate 30 near downtown, police reported.

Officers were dispatched the exit to U.S. 287/East Lancaster Avenue at 8:12 p.m. after a woman called 911 to say she had run out of gas at the exit, had two children in her GMC and was scared because the vehicle was on the shoulder of the busy freeway.

After a patrol officer arrived, a female driver, “ignoring conditions and requests to slow down,” hit the patrol car and “another vehicle,” Sgt. Steve Enright, a police spokesman, wrote in an email. The officer was still seated in his car.

The officer was transported to John Peter Smith Hospital, MedStar spokesman Matt Zavadsky said. His injuries appeared minor.

A passenger in the vehicle that hit the patrol car was taken to Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital with minor injuries.

No information was available about the initial stranded motorist or her children. It was not clear whether her GMC was the vehicle hit at the same time as the patrol car. —Monica S. Nagy

This story was originally published September 29, 2015 at 10:37 PM with the headline "Fort Worth officer’s car rear-ended as he stopped to help motorist on I-30."