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Two Injured in Wrong-way Crash on I-81

SCRANTON — A tractor-trailer driver from Canada was going south on Interstate 81 in Scranton when he saw headlights coming right at him. Troopers report t...

SCRANTON -- A tractor-trailer driver from Canada was going south on Interstate 81 in Scranton when he saw headlights coming right at him. Troopers report the truck hit a white Lexus head on. They don't know how that driver, Jason Sands, 32, of Kingsley, got on the wrong side of the highway.

Sands is in critical condition.  A passenger in the tractor-trailer suffered minor injuries.

The crash happened where the highway goes through a rock-cut. Neither driver had much room or time to avoid the collision.

Back in October, and only a few miles away from this crash, a man was killed when a wrong-way driver hit his car on the southbound side of Interstate 81 in Dunmore.

The wrong way driver in that crash, Adam Kovaleski, was arrested for suspicion of DUI and charges are pending. Investigators are not saying how he got on the wrong side of the highway.

PennDOT officials said they don't know, but after each of these crashes, crews checked 81 on and off ramps to make sure all the signs met state codes.

Highway signs met the most complaints when we talked to drivers from out-of-state.

Jesse Tarr is a transplant from New Jersey and recently wound up the wrong way on a highway off ramp.

"I couldn`t even see the one way sign and actually ended up on the one way. And I'm actually a pretty good driver and I was pretty shocked that it happened to me," Tarr said.

"People can get easily sidetracked. I think this person needs to be given the benefit of the doubt in the situation," he added.

State Police said they have not talked to the wrong way driver from Monday morning's crash, Jason Sands, who is hospitalized in critical condition.

According to newspaper reports Newswatch 16 found, Sands was involved in a crash in 2011 in which he fled the scene. No word if he faced any criminal charges in that 2011 crash.

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