Three people died in an I-91 freeway accident early Thursday on the westbound 91 Freeway in Riverside, after a driver entered the wrong lane near 14th Street and caused a head-on crash. California Highway Patrol officers were sent about 2 a.m. to the report.
The crash shut down all lanes of westbound 91 near 14th Street at 4:30 a.m. before traffic in all directions reopened at 8:39 a.m. The closure hit a corridor that carries steady flow through Riverside, and it lasted for hours while crews cleared the scene.
Riverside crash details
A Riverside County spokesperson said the wrong-way driver hit a big rig and a third vehicle was involved. Officers found a white SUV on its side, the big rig leaking fluid, and a damaged black sedan. ABC7 identified the sedan as a BMV and said one additional person was taken to a local hospital in an unknown condition.
The incident log adds one more detail that helps explain the sequence: one vehicle was swerving in between cars while traveling the wrong way in the second and third lanes. That leaves the basic route clear enough for investigators, but not the entry point that sent the driver onto the westbound lanes in the first place.
CHP response on 91 Freeway
The California Highway Patrol provided the crash details and the timeline from the early-morning response through the reopening at 8:39 a.m. For drivers using the 91 Freeway in Riverside, the practical takeaway was simple: the closure ended, but the head-on crash left three dead and one person hospitalized.
The unanswered part is the one that matters most for safety reviews on this stretch of freeway: how the wrong-way driver got onto the westbound lanes near 14th Street. Until that is explained, the crash remains a severe example of how fast a wrong-way entry can turn a routine commute corridor into a closed scene for hours.
