A man from Sturgis was killed last week when the van he was driving collided with a moose on Hwy. 5 near Humboldt.
Emergency crews were called to a collision between a vehicle and a moose three kilometres east of the Bruno turnoff at 6:25 p.m. on January 3.
A 43-year-old man from Sturgis who had been driving an eastbound minivan was pronounced dead at the scene. His name has not been released.
The other occupants of the van - an adult female and three children - were uninjured in the crash.
Humboldt and Bruno fire departments were called to the scene, but no one involved in the crash had to be extricated from the vehicle, reported Humboldt's interim fire chief Mike Kwasnica.
Firefighters controlled traffic around the scene, which was blocked completely in the early stages of the emergency response.
"We made the decision to shut the whole highway down because we had potential patients and vehicles spread over a wide area for a short time," reported paramedic Derek Dagenais with Humboldt and District Ambulance Service.
Travel on Hwy. 5 in the vicinity of the crash was then limited to one lane for about four hours while the investigation was conducted.
The investigation revealed that the moose had already been hit by another vehicle, a westbound truck, near the location of the second crash. The moose did significant damage to that first vehicle, but no one was injured.
That collision put the moose into the path of the eastbound van.
The ambulance transported four people to Humboldt District Hospital with minor injuries, and assessed and released three more at the scene who had been in the first vehicle to hit the moose.
There was one bystander at the scene prior to the arrival of emergency crews who was instrumental in assisting the people involved, Dagenais reported.
"She gave a family in need a lot of support. She was a true Good Samaritan," he stated.
