CHP Officer Hurt as Cycle Hits a Dog

SANTA ANA — A California Highway Patrol officer was seriously injured Friday when his motorcycle struck the carcass of a dog and he was thrown to the shoulder of the Santa Ana Freeway, authorities said.

Officer Ruben C. Barajas, 35, sustained a concussion, major chest injuries and abrasions. His condition was upgraded late Friday afternoon from serious to stable at Western Medical Center-Santa Ana, a hospital representative said.

The accident occurred at 8:40 a.m. just south of Newport Boulevard, shortly after Barajas signaled a motorist to pull over, CHP Officer Angel Johnson said.

As the driver maneuvered onto the freeway shoulder, his sedan obscured Barajas’ view of the carcass of a dog lying near the solid white line that separates the shoulder from the right lane. The officer, who was following closely behind the car, was traveling about 35 m.p.h., Johnson said.

“He didn’t have enough time to stop and lost control of the motorcycle,” Johnson said. “The car (tires) straddled the dog, and he couldn’t see it.”

Barajas--dressed in the standard CHP uniform of a helmet, knee-high boots, wool pants, a shirt, thick gloves and a long-sleeved, padded nylon jacket--was thrown onto the freeway shoulder. The motorcycle landed in the far right lane of the freeway.

“He was probably trying to check his side-view mirrors when he was pulling over, to protect himself and to slow traffic, and wasn’t paying attention to the roadway under the car ahead,” said CHP Officer Lyle Whitten of the Westminster station.

At CHP headquarters in Sacramento, which keeps records of all state accidents involving officers in the line of duty, there were no recent reports of a similar accident, spokesman Steve Kohler said.

“It’s very unusual,” Kohler said. “We’ve had reports of motorcycle officers hitting mufflers, tires and even a ladder. But there is nothing about dead animals.”

Barajas was planning to cite the motorist for driving on the shoulder of the northbound Costa Mesa Freeway, but first followed the vehicle onto the southbound Santa Ana Freeway “for safety reasons,” Johnson said.

The unidentified motorist stopped and offered aid to Barajas after the accident, she added.

Barajas served nine years with the CHP at its western Los Angeles station and has been a motorcycle patrol officer for eight years. He came to the Santa Ana CHP station four months ago, Officer Keith Thornhill said.

No information was available on Barajas’ driving record with the CHP. In the last 13 years, the CHP’s 400 motorcycle officers have had no fatalities, Whitten said.

The California Department of Transportation is responsible for removing dead animals and other debris from state and interstate highways. Work crews from the department arrived shortly after the accident to remove the dead dog, Johnson said.

In a separate incident early Friday afternoon, a Santa Ana police motorcycle officer was slightly injured while riding to work from his Rancho Santa Margarita home.

Police reports said the unidentified officer was cut off when a driver turned left in front of him at the intersection of Via Flores and Marguerite Parkway. He was treated and released at Saddleback Community Hospital.