Sunday wreck

By MICHELLE WILSON

Staff Writer

Published Sept. 21, 1999

A Troy teenager was among seven drivers killed this weekends in accidents on Alabama roads, according to Alabama State Troopers.

Nathaniel Randall Sanders, 19, died Sunday when the car he was driving ran off Alabama Highway 87 and struck a tree in Pike County. The 9 a.m. accident took place about two miles south of Troy. Sanders was not wearing a seat belt, according to state troopers. The accident is still under investigation.

Also killed was a Manassas, Va., man who was driving a vehicle involved in a three-car accident Sunday in Mobile County. State troopers did not immediately release his name. The accident is under investigation. It happened about 10 miles west of Mobile on U.S. 98 at 2:20 p.m.

Also Sunday, a Tuscumbia man was killed when the car he was driving ran off U.S. 72 and overturned in Colbert County. Melvin Jeffreys, 66, died in the accident at 10:45 a.m., two miles west of Tuscumbia, a state trooper spokesman said. Jeffreys was not wearing his seat belt.

Tyrone Mobley, 21, of Lauderdale, Miss., died when the car he was driving ran off Sumter County Highway 19 and struck a tree. The accident happened at 3 a.m. Sunday, four miles north of York, troopers said. Mobley was not wearing a seat belt.

Ralph Leland Raines, 58, of Birmingham died when the car he was driving ran off Interstate 59 and struck several trees following a collision with another car. The accident happened at 10 p.m. Saturday, one mile south of Trussville in Jefferson County, troopers said. Raines was not wearing a seat belt and was ejected.

Christopher Rice, 19, of Florence died in a two-car accident on U.S. 72 in Limestone County. Troopers said one of the cars failed to yield the right of way to the second. The accident happened at 10:50 p.m. Friday, two miles west of Athens. Rice was wearing a seat belt.

Bobby Dale Ratliff, 49, died when the car he was driving ran off a Walker County road and struck an embankment and a tree. The accident happened at 12:10 a.m. Saturday on Old Piney Woods Road, two miles north of Argo. Ratliff was not wearing a seat belt, troopers said.