Washington State Patrol trooper safe after suspected DUI crash

A State Patrol trooper is safe after their patrol car was hit by a man suspected of DUI early Sunday. And this is not the first. In fact, it is the third trooper vehicle hit in the last 10 days on I-5. Troopers say their work is already dangerous and these incidents can be avoided. Front of our minds when you're out there on the freeway and we really need the public's help. We need the drivers that are using the roadways to pay attention, to slow down. And to not drive impaired, and that's really the keys because these are preventable. FOX 13's Taylor Winkle has the details on this concerning trend. Troopers are being hit at an alarming rate, three vehicles in 10 days, 19 troopers injured on the job so far this year. And with those stats, you can only imagine how many more close calls they experienced like in yesterday morning's crash. We know the suspect in this crash is a 21 year old stationed at a JBLM. I wanna walk you through what happened with these pictures showing the aftermath. From WSP, the trooper was blocking a stalled car on southbound I-5 near Des Moines when this happened. The driver and passenger in that car were teen girls. The trooper was trying to help them out. They were all standing on the shoulder, and you can see the trooper's patrol vehicle, an unmarked Ford Explorer here, just smashed in after that 21-year-old suspect came barreling into the trooper's car in his Honda Civic, according to WSP. The suspect's car hit the troopers so hard that it caused it to crash into that original broken down car. The 21 year old driver as well as his two passengers all taken to Harborview Medical Center. A spokesperson for Harborview says he is in satisfactory condition, but his passengers are both still in critical. The two teen girls and the trooper are okay, but we've seen devastating outcomes from similar crashes. This is a look at two other incidents involving troopers in the last 10 days, one on southbound I-5 near 520 and one on northbound 5 near 272nd. In the first nine months of this year, not including October or November, Washington State Patrol reports 64 units were struck while conducting traffic enforcement or collision investigations including. Those 19 troopers who were injured and it was last December when trooper Tara Marisa Gooding was killed outside her patrol car while investigating a two car crash. If you see an emergency vehicle on the road, state law requires you to move over and slow down. If it is not possible to move over, you are required to slow down at least 10 miles below the posted speed limit. Reporting in Seattle, I'm Taylor Winkle, Fox 13 News.