2 Men Die After Separate Riverside County Accidents

men were fatally injured Tuesday in separate collisions on western Riverside County freeways, a coroner’s spokeswoman said.

Robert Leroy Mudge, 39, of Alta Loma died several hours after his pickup truck slammed into the rear of a tractor-trailer on Interstate 15 just south of Corona.

Mudge was northbound, near El Cerrito Road, when he rear-ended the slow-moving truck at a speed of about 45 m.p.h., said Officer John Anderson, a California Highway Patrol spokesman. Mudge died later at Riverside General Hospital.

Danny Lee Holderness, 29, of Riverside died when his car smashed into an overpass and exploded near downtown Riverside.

Holderness was westbound on the Riverside Freeway when he passed a truck and moved back into the right lane, then veered off the roadway and into the overpass, Anderson said. Holderness, a guard at the California Institution for Men, was pronounced dead at the scene.