{"id":42938,"date":"2021-12-29T00:59:40","date_gmt":"2021-12-29T07:59:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/update-man-killed-in-multi-vehicle-crash-south-of-cortez-is-identified\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:10:32","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:10:32","slug":"update-man-killed-in-multi-vehicle-crash-south-of-cortez-is-identified","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/update-man-killed-in-multi-vehicle-crash-south-of-cortez-is-identified\/","title":{"rendered":"Update: Man killed in multi-vehicle crash south of Cortez is identified"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=128787ad-3319-5157-b8e5-3ba8545f7917&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" alt=\"Blotter lights\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">Blotter lights<\/span><span class=\"credit\">cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n<p>The man who died in a four-vehicle crash Thursday has been identified as Drake Dale Ray Frost, age 28, according to the Montezuma County Coroner\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n<p>Frost, who is from Towaoc and Ignacio, died at the scene from trauma, said coroner George Deavers. He had been ejected from the vehicle.<\/p>\n<p>The crash occurred at mile marker 25 south of Towaoc just after 6 p.m. and closed the highway for more than two hours. Frost is suspected of causing the crash, according to Colorado State Patrol Master Trooper Gary Cutler.<\/p>\n<p>According to investigators at the scene, Frost pulled out into traffic from a side road and collided with a vehicle, then was hit by a snowplow, Deavers said.<\/p>\n<p>Because the victim was Native American, the Bureau of Indian affairs and FBI were  investigating the crash, Cutler said.<\/p>\n<p>The highway was closed for about two hours for the crash investigation and cleanup,  Cutler said. It reopened at 8:22 p.m.<\/p>\n<p>The crash happened on wet roads during rainy conditions, and also caused injuries, according to Montezuma County Sheriff Steve Nowlin.<\/p>\n<p>A sheriff\u2019s deputy responded and provided traffic control. The Cortez Fire Protection District, Colorado State Patrol, Southwest Health System ambulance and the county coroner also responded.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>U.S. Highway 160\/491 closed for two hours Thursday near Towaoc<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16302,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,60,29,254,144],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-42938","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-newsletter","tag-road-crash","tag-towaoc"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42938","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42938"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42938\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85510,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42938\/revisions\/85510"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42938"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42938"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42938"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=42938"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}