CHP Advises Drivers to Use Caution on Forest Roads : Safety: Three people have died in Angeles National Forest accidents this year. The toll is characterized as high.

Vehicle deaths on the narrow canyon roads of Angeles National Forest this year are expected to match or surpass the record high numbers of the past two years, law enforcement officials warn.

In the first five months of 1993, three people were killed on the mountainous roads of the recreational area northeast of Los Angeles, compared to seven fatalities in all of 1992 and eight in 1991.

“Three is a lot of fatal accidents to have in such a short period of time,” said California Highway Patrol Officer Richard Obregon, who patrols the forest roads.

He said the number of fatalities might have been even higher this year had one major mountain road not been closed for about a month due to snow.

In the past four years, the annual number of fatal roadway accidents in the forest has more than doubled. Most of those accidents have been on Angeles Crest Highway, Angeles Forest Highway and Big Tujunga Canyon Road, between the Antelope Valley and the Foothill Freeway.

Three fatal roadway collisions occurred in national forest roads in 1989 and three in 1990, according to a CHP report.

To warn motorists against drunk driving during the long Memorial Day weekend, Obregon and other law enforcement officials have placed in front of two ranger stations the crushed hulls of automobiles involved in mountain-road accidents.

The wrecked cars are part of a safety campaign by the CHP, the U. S. Forest Service, the California Department of Transportation, the Los Angeles County sheriff’s and fire departments, Verdugo Hills Hospital and Huntington Memorial Hospital.

In a joint news conference Monday, representatives of the groups warned that roadway accidents may increase during the coming Memorial Day weekend as young people celebrate graduations and families vacation in the forest.

Most of the victims of roadway accidents in Angeles National Forest end up at Verdugo Hills Hospital in Glendale, said the hospital’s clinical director, Suzanne Ostrom, who participated in the event.

“We see lots of people come in with half the road embedded in them,” she said. “We see people who have been drinking and victims of people who have been drinking.”

Many victims are motorcyclists who missed a turn or crashed into cars on the curves, Ostrom said. But others are tourists who were hit by drunk drivers.

“We’ve had to call people from as far away as Japan to tell them that their loved one has been brought in,” she said.