SUNDERLAND — A head-on collision caused by a loose cow on Amherst Road (Route 116) resulted in 11 people being injured and transported to area hospitals, along with the death of a cow, on Thursday morning.
According to Sunderland Police Chief Erik Demetropoulos, Sunderland officers were already responding to a report of 15 to 20 loose cows in town when they received a call about a “car versus cow” crash at 716 Amherst Road at 1:26 a.m.
“The officer arrived and saw that in fact one car had struck the cow, bounced off the cow and hit head-on another car,” Demetropoulos explained.
Along with the Sunderland Police Department, the Amherst Police Department, Massachusetts State Police, Sunderland Fire Department, Amherst Fire Department and South County EMS responded to the collision between a 2011 Nissan Rogue, which seats up to five occupants, and a 2016 Toyota Highlander, which can seat up to eight.
“Everybody had some form of injury,” Demetropoulos said.
The 11 occupants’ injuries included facial wounds, bruising, cuts from shattered glass and others, Demetropoulos said. Those who were injured were transported to Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Baystate Franklin Medical Center in Greenfield and Cooley Dickinson Hospital in Northampton. Although responding officers called a LIFE STAR helicopter, it was unable to transport patients due to the weather.
“It was a significant accident,” said Amherst’s Assistant Fire Chief Stephen Gaughan.
According to Demetropoulos, those who were injured in the crash came from Massachusetts towns as far as Merrimac and Lynnfield, and a few were from Maine.
The airbags of both vehicles deployed and both vehicles were towed, Demetropoulos said.
Four or five of the loose cows also ran through the fence of an Amherst farm with about 200 sheep, leading the sheep to escape onto side roads.
While first responders worked on scene, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) closed a section of Route 116 stretching from Old Amherst Road in Sunderland to Plum Tree Road in Amherst.
