DUNMORE -- State police in Lackawanna County say there have been 23 reports of people driving the wrong way on Interstate 81 since September.
This information came out Tuesday as authorities were asking the public again to help them solve last month's wrong-way crash that killed five people.
State police have done research and responded with some changes in protocol that could help prevent what happened about a week and a half ago when five people were killed as a result of a wrong-way driver.
The impound lot behind the state police barracks in Dunmore is tragically full. This is where troopers store vehicles involved in deadly crashes currently under investigation. Four of them in the lot right now were involved in wrong-way crashes in Lackawanna County.
Most recently a wrong-way driver led to the deaths of five people on a stretch of Interstate 81 near Clarks Summit.
Police want to know where this wrong-way driver was before the crash and what could have led him to go about seven miles in the wrong direction.
They are asking the public for any information on that driver, Gennadiy Manannikov, and his passenger who was killed in the crash, Ashley Wheeler.
"Every resource has been made available to us," said Lackawanna County District Attorney Shane Scanlon. "We are trying to put this full night together so that we have a complete picture."
Prosecutors and troopers revealed that since September there have been three wrong-way crashes. Two wrong-way drivers have been charged with DUI, and there have been almost two dozen reports of wrong-way drivers.
In addition, police in Lackawanna County are changing protocol. Though state troopers patrol the interstate, 911 dispatchers will also call municipal departments when a wrong-way driver is spotted.
"In this case, looking at the totality of the circumstances, I don't think this could have been handled any better and I think it's well in the realm of speculation that had a notification been made in this case, that we would have been able to avert this tragedy," said Capt. Chris Paris, Pennsylvania State Police.
State police added that they don't think the recent problems with wrong-way drivers are caused by the signs, noting that the most recent wrong-way driver most likely passed a total of nine wrong way signs; plus, the big green signs he passed would be silver going the wrong way.
Troopers think there were at least 40 different indicators that should have told that driver that he was on the wrong side of the highway.
