3 San Diego Athletes Die, 10 Hurt as Van Flips After Regatta

Three San Diego college athletes were killed and 10 others were injured Sunday night when a van carrying the San Diego State University rowing club home from a meet in Sacramento had a blowout and crashed on Interstate 5 in the San Joaquin Valley, near Santa Nella.

The van was traveling about 85 m.p.h. at 8:20 p.m. Sunday when the left rear tire blew out, causing driver Joseph Farrage, 19, to lose control of the vehicle, which rolled several times and caught fire, said Doyne Cates of the California Highway Patrol. All but two of those aboard were thrown from the van, including the three who were killed.

Derek Christopher Guelker, 18, of Orange; Mark Andrew Skinner, 19, of San Diego, and James Marshall O’Hara, 20, of Englewood, Colo., were pronounced dead at the scene by Dr. Jeffrey Nordella, a passing motorist who identified himself to the highway patrol as a physician at UCLA Medical Center. All three were San Diego State University students.

“They were all terrific people, well-rounded students,” said SDSU crew coach Chuck Datte, who was not with the team members who crashed. “They were all volunteers--students first, athletes second. There’s no money in rowing. They were just having fun.”

Of those injured, nine were San Diego State crew members. The 10th was Liz Ciarrochi, 20, a rower for the University of San Diego crew team.

The CHP is investigating the accident, Cates said, adding that empty beer cans were found in the van after the accident. A blood-alcohol test was performed on Farrage, but the CHP has not determined whether the driver will be cited, Cates said.

Bill Finley, San Diego State’s assistant athletic director, said the accident was the worst tragedy in the history of the university’s athletic program.

“In terms of a team coming back from a competition, I can’t remember anything like this happening,” Finley said. “It’s a shock. Because they were representing San Diego State University, everybody here feels a sense of loss.”

Most severely injured in the accident were Mark Starkey, 22, and Jeff Moorehouse, 19, whose conditions had improved to satisfactory by Monday night, according to a spokeswoman at Doctors Medical Center in Modesto. Dan Wright, 19; Brian Eliel, 21, and Ciarrochi were reported in “fair and stable” condition.

David O’Connor, 22; John Bachman, 21; Daryl McDonald, 23, and Troy Freeman, 23, were treated for cuts and bruises at nearby hospitals. Farrage, who was trapped in the driver’s seat and received third-degree burns on his feet from a fire in the engine compartment, was treated at Los Banos Community Hospital in Los Banos but not admitted, a hospital spokesman said.

Minutes before the accident, CHP officer Gene Ecklund had noticed the speeding van from the opposite side of the freeway and was turning around to pursue it when he saw “a cloud of dust” where the van had left the roadway, Cates said.

SDSU President Thomas Day said the school’s administration was “very saddened” by the incident.

“We feel very sympathetic for the families of the students who were killed,” Day said. “It was just one of your traffic circumstances on Mother’s Day where some people who were happy they had won some crew events were anxious to get home and maybe too anxious.”

San Diego State’s victory Sunday in the Pacific Coast Rowing Championships’ junior varsity competition was the first victory for the three students who were killed. They had been promoted from the freshman novice crew only a week before.

“They give so much for this,” Mike McDaniel, assistant crew coach, told the Daily Aztec, SDSU’s student newspaper. “Their home life suffers, their grades suffer a little bit, guys break up with their girlfriends. They hadn’t won too many races in the open division, so this was their first big deal. And when they won, it was quite a big day for them.”

“I think the biggest thing you could say is they wanted it--they wanted to win,” Datte told the Daily Aztec. “It seemed to me they were the kind of people who are hard strivers. . . . They did what they wanted to.”

Datte said he wants the university to “set up a tribute” for the three students and fly its flags at half-staff.

Because crew is a club sport at SDSU, unaffiliated with the athletic department, team members must provide their own funding and their own transportation to meets. The van involved in the accident was leased from Southwest Leasing and Rental in Mission Valley.

No one in the rented van was older than 23, even though car rental agencies frequently require drivers of leased cars to be at least 25 years old. Although it is not required by law, most rental agencies impose the minimum age to keep their liability insurance premiums low, said Jorge Sandoval of the state insurance commissioner’s office in San Francisco.

“If they didn’t, their liability rates would go sky high,” Sandoval said. He added that, if an agency rented a car to an underage driver who subsequently was involved in an accident, the agency rather than the insurance company “would be potentially liable” in legal actions.

Officials at Southwest Leasing and Rental refused to comment on the company’s rental policies, referring questions to the firm’s attorney in Los Angeles. The attorney was unavailable for comment Monday.

Day said the accident would not cause university officials to reconsider the policy of allowing club teams to travel by privately rented vans without supervision.

“I think we have pretty good policies and procedures,” Day said. “It remains to be seen whether the policies and procedures were followed. . . . Sometimes you even have accidents when you follow the procedures.”

More than 50 members of the SDSU rowing club had participated Saturday and Sunday in the Pacific Coast Rowing Championships in Sacramento. They won four events.