Ohio highway patrol trooper responding to aid call dies when car rolls over, colleague hurt

Ohio highway trooper dies in crash, colleague hurt

CAREY, Ohio — A state highway patrol cruiser responding to a call rolled over on the side of a roadway Thursday evening, killing one trooper and injuring another.

The crash occurred just outside Carey, a village of about 4,000 residents in the northwest part of the state.

Trooper Andrew C. Baldridge, who was driving, and Trooper Mark McLaughlin, a passenger, were responding to an aid call from a Wyandot County sheriff’s deputy when their car went off the right side of the roadway and rolled several times, the Ohio State Highway Patrol said. Both troopers appear to have been wearing seat belts, it said.

Baldridge, who was 25 years old and had graduated from the highway patrol academy in December, died in the crash.

McLaughlin, 33 and a highway patrol veteran, was injured and was hospitalized in fair condition.

The highway patrol said it was mourning the loss of Baldridge and praying for McLaughlin’s recovery from his injuries.

“This is a tragedy for the patrol and the Department of Public Safety, our young trooper’s family and all who knew and worked with this promising young man,” the patrol’s superintendent, Col. David W. Dicken, said in a statement. “Our prayers go out to him and his family tonight, as well as to Trooper McLaughlin and his family.”

The cause of the crash was being investigated.

The highway patrol didn’t release information about the deputy’s mutual aid call.

(This version CORRECTS spokesman’s title to colonel instead of superintendent colonel.)