Four Clallam Bay residents killed last year when the car in which they were riding landed upside down in the Pysht River used marijuana shortly before the crash, according to a lengthy report completed by the Washington State Patrol.
The report on the North Olympic Peninsula’s deadliest crash of 2004 offers clues to one of the lingering questions about the wreck:
What happened between 1 a.m., when the four young men were stopped outside an underage party in Port Angeles, and 6 a.m., when the car with occupants inside was found submerged in the river’s 40-degree water?
The car most likely veered off state Highway 112 and into the river earlier in the morning, the report concludes — closer to 2 a.m. than 6 a.m. It would’ve taken about an hour for the car to reach the crash site.
And while intoxication was likely a contributing factor — the driver, John Hubble, registered the largest concentration of marijuana in his system — the main cause was listed as inattention to the road.
Killed in the March 27, 2004 crash were Hubble, 20; Erik Kroeger, 18; Cassidy Hunter, 16; and Damien Anderson, 18. All four drowned.
The report was long in coming because it was investigated by a “major accident investigation team,” a multi-agency group that delves deeply into all aspects of a motor vehicle crash.
Stopped and cited
Some of the report’s contents were already known.
For example, a state trooper had talked with the young men around 1 a.m. as law enforcement officers swarmed a party on South Alder Lane in the Morse Creek area east of Port Angeles.
He administered breath tests for alcohol on all four. Kroeger’s blood-alcohol content measured 0.085 percent, and Anderson blew a 0.041.
They were both cited for being minors in possession of alcohol.
Though Cassidy’s blood-alcohol content measured 0.06 percent, the trooper did not ticket him, saying it was “a negligible amount.”
State driving law recognizes 0.08 percent as legally drunk.
Hubble identified himself as the designated driver and had no alcohol in his system, according to the trooper’s test. The trooper’s report states that Hubble “did not appear intoxicated.”
Then, at about 1:05 a.m., he let the young men go so that he could help officers dealing with about two dozen others at the party.
Shortly after 6 a.m., a man driving east on Highway 112 spotted Hubble’s white Chevrolet Geo Metro resting on its roof in the Pysht River.
Another passing driver happened to have a dry suit and was able to wade into the frigid river to inspect the car. He couldn’t get the car’s doors open, but could tell that there were bodies inside.
Emergency workers had to cut the roof off of the car to get the bodies out.
They also found two marijuana pipes and two small plastic bags of “green vegetable matter” in the back seat of the wrecked car, according to the investigative report.
