PORTAGE, Ind. (STMW) – Indiana State Police are urging motorists to drive cautiously and to reduce their speed on wet or ice- and snow-covered roads, following a fatal crash on the Inidna Toll Road near Portage early Saturday.

Approximately 4:30 a.m., a 1999 GMC Savannah van was westbound on the Toll Road, in the right lane, at the 21.9 mile marker — which is approximately 1 mile west of the Portage Toll Plaza/exit — when the driver lost control on the snow/icy roads, a release from Indiana State Police said.

The GMC van spun out into the left lane where a 2007 Freightliner semi pulling a flatbed trailer hit the van broadside in the driver’s door. The Freightliner, owned by Burnham Trucking Company out of East Chicago, Indiana, was not loaded. The driver, Michael A. Mosher, 57, of Portage, was taken to Porter Hospital in Portage and treated and released after complaining of pain in his neck. Mosher was cited for a log book violation, state police said.

The driver of the GMC van, Pierre Louise DeVaugh Smith, 26, of Hammond, was pronounced dead at the scene, of blunt force trauma, by the Porter County Coroner.

This was the second fatal accident on the Toll Road overnight. A 42-year-old semi-trailer truck driver was killed when he hit a horse trailer that had broken free from an SUV on the Indiana Toll Road near Chesterton about 12:25 a.m.

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