Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, October 2, 1995                   TAG: 9510020135
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: DIANE STRUZZI
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

BLOWN TIRE CAUSES FATAL I-81 ACCIDENT

David Lee Mason of Berwind, W.Va., was pronounced dead at 2:05 p.m. Police said the left front tire of his pickup truck blew out as he was traveling south near the New River bridge. Mason's truck crossed the median and went up an embankment.

In Floyd County, a 53-year-old Rocky Mount man was killed late Saturday after his sport-utility vehicle was hit by an oncoming car, state police said.

Norman Wayne Swartz was driving north on Virginia 681, near Virginia 860, when a pickup truck crossed into his lane, hitting his vehicle head-on. Swartz died at the accident scene.

The driver of the vehicle that hit Swartz was Brian Wesley Perkins, 20, of Floyd, according to Trooper D.E. Holley. Perkins has not been charged.

Keywords:
FATALITY