One dead, six injured in Banning car accident

One person is dead and six others were injured in a traffic collision involving two vehicles on Saturday afternoon. The accident was reported at 1:37 p.m. on the I-10E near Hargrave St. in Banning.

Firefighters and California Highway Patrol responded to the accident and found one person ejected from a vehicle. Six patients were taken to a nearby hospital with injuries. The seventh person died at the scene, according to CalFire.

At around 3 p.m. what was left of a wrangled SUV could be seen getting towed from the Hargrave exit, which was closed off to traffic.

"I was going up (north)," Banning resident, Bo Harris said.

Harris knows all too well what it's like when there is a backup on the freeway. He had to re-route.

"Once we get to that tracks right there it’s hard to get across when you have any kind of accident or the state working on there, so we got 22nd street just to get back down to this side," Harris said.

At one point an officer recovered a carseat from the side of the road while another officer searched for additional items that may have been ejected.

The off-ramp was reopened a few hours later.

The cause of crash is under investigation. The identities of those involved were not immediately released.