Highway 36 East of Red Bluff was closed for almost 7 hours on Friday after a fatal head-on collision. At 2:20PM in the afternoon a 31-year-old man from Paynes Creek was driving a 1979 Datsun 280ZX at a high rate of speed eastbound west of Paynes Creek Loop when he lost control and crossed over the double-yellow center line. The small sports car smashed into a Kenworth truck hauling an excavator on a lowboy trailer. It’s not known if the Datsun driver was wearing a seatbelt, but he was ejected and died at the scene. The truck driver, 43-year-old Luke Andrews of Orland, was not injured. The CHP says alcohol is believed to have been a factor.
-Steve Gibson