A Lancaster woman was airlifted to Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte on Friday after she was struck by an ambulance on its way to a wreck.

S.C. Highway Patrol Lt. Mike Oliver identified the woman as 59-year-old Mary S. Hammond of 1612 Great Falls Road.

A hospital spokeswoman said Saturday that Hammond is listed in serious condition.

The wreck happened about 4 p.m. Friday at the intersection of Meeting Street and Woodland Drive.

Oliver said a 1995 Ford ambulance driven by Lancaster County employee Marty Bowman Brown, 30, of Fort Mill was headed west on Meeting Street, responding to a wreck at the intersection of Meeting and Plantation Road.

Hammond was headed south on Woodland in a 2002 Chevrolet Impala. When she went through the intersection, her car was struck in the driver's side door by the ambulance.

The impact was so hard it pushed her car about 25 feet off the roadway and down an embankment. The impact sheered a median sign at ground level, sent it airborne and impaled it about three feet in the ground near Hammond's mangled car.

Witnesses said Brown and another EMT jumped from the ambulance to immediately help Hammond, who was trapped inside the car.

Splintered and broken car parts and glass were strewn across three lanes of Meeting Street, blocking off the roadway to traffic.

Lancaster Fire Department first responders and emergency workers were called to the scene and freed Hammond from the car.
 
"It happened so fast that it was almost unbelievable," said Anna Watkins, who was headed east on Meeting Street when the ambulance struck the car. Watkins stood in the roadway watching as recuse workers freed Hammond.

"Her car spun around in the road and it drove her straight down the bank," Watkins said. "I hope she's going to be OK. They hit pretty hard."

Neither Brown nor the other EMT was injured.

Hammond was transported to Springs Memorial Hospital and then airlifted to CMC.

"You just hate it when something like this happens," said Lanny Bernard, the county's EMS director. "Hopefully, everybody is going to be all right."

Although the wreck occurred in the city limits, since it involve a county government vehicle, the state Highway Patrol is the investigating agency.

Oliver said witnesses statements of the incident show that Hammond had a green light and the ambulance had a red light.

But Oliver said the wreck remains under investigation and won't be completed until all the facts are gathered in the next few days.

"That's about all we can say at this time," Oliver said.  

Photo by Chip Oglesby; Lancaster