A late night Saturday collision outside Durango, Colo. left a Senoia resident dead and injured 14 other people.

John Hollberg, 23, died when his 1990 Ford Taurus was struck by an apparently intoxicated driver in a 1977 GMC pick-up truck at 8:45 p.m. on a small county road in the western Colorado town.

Hollberg is the son of Frank Hollberg III, who owns Hollberg's furniture store in Senoia.

The driver of the truck, Bob Hardwick, 21, was charged with vehicular homicide and other charges are pending, according to a report from the Colorado State Patrol.

Hollberg was working at a dude ranch this summer and had five other people in the car when the crash occurred.

He was traveling westbound on County Road 240 in Durango, when Hardwick, who was traveling eastbound, crossed the center line and hit a 1985 Toyota Tacoma pickup with 10 passengers in front of Hollberg's, the report said.

The collision with the Tacoma drove the Tacoma off the road and Hardwick continued driving in the eastbound lane until he collided with Hollberg's vehicle, according to reports.

Among the injured in Tacoma was Luke Recker, 21, of Auburn, Ind., who was a basketball player at Indiana University last fall.

Recker had decided to transfer to the University of Arizona this fall.

In an interview with WTHR-13 in Indianapolis, Recker hoped for a quick recovery period.

“I thank God that I'm still here, along with my girlfriend and her brother. I've just got to keep praying that we'll all pull through this,” he said.

Recker said his most painful injury is a severely lacerated left ear.

Hollberg's funeral arrangements can be found in his obituary on page.`

Back to News Home Page | Back to the top of the page