Wichita man, 58, identified as victim in fatal Kansas Turnpike crash near Belle Plaine

The person killed Friday on the Kansas Turnpike has been identified as 58-year-old Douglas K. Rogers of Wichita.

Kansas Turnpike Authority spokeswoman Rachel Bell said Saturday that Rogers apparently was walking or standing outside of his 2008 Hyundai SUV at about 8 p.m. when he was struck by a commercial truck heading northbound near the Belle Plaine exit.

He died at the scene.

Bell said an earlier collision involving Rogers’ SUV apparently tipped off the chain of events that led to his death. Rogers, she said, was driving northbound, possibly after entering the turnpike from the Belle Plaine service area, when he lost control of the Hyundai for an unknown reason and slammed into a concrete barrier wall.

At some point Rogers got out of the Hyundai on his own, she said, before another northbound SUV crashed into it.

The commercial truck then came upon the collision and hit Rogers, apparently while trying to avoid the wreckage, Bell said.

Bell said Rogers’ vehicle had no headlights when it was hit by the second SUV, but she didn’t know whether they had been turned off or whether they had been damaged in Rogers’ impact with the barrier wall.

A turnpike accident report says the 18-year-old Abilene woman driving the SUV that hit Rogers’ vehicle was hospitalized at Wesley Medical Center. Her condition was unknown Saturday.

The 48-year-old Wichita man driving the commercial truck was unhurt, according to Bell and the accident report.

The collisions remain under investigation, Bell said Saturday.

This story was originally published September 20, 2014 at 5:05 PM with the headline "Wichita man, 58, identified as victim in fatal Kansas Turnpike crash near Belle Plaine."