DATE: Monday, September 15, 1997            TAG: 9709150040

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B3   EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA 

SOURCE: BY LANE DEGREGORY, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: BUXTON                            LENGTH:   28 lines

AVON MAN INVOLVED IN SERIOUS CAR ACCIDENT

Five hours after his Chevette collided head-on with a Ford sport utility vehicle, a 28-year-old Hatteras Island man was in serious condition before going into surgery Sunday night.

Brandon Mitchell suffered ``severe head injuries - and probably a broken femur,'' Dare County Sheriff Bert Austin said.

``They had to cut the top off his car. The motor had been pushed back into the front seat,'' Austin said. ``They had to cut the steering wheel out and use the jaws of life to get him out.''

Mitchell, an Avon resident who cooks at the Big Wave Diner, was semi-conscious when rescue workers arrived. A medical helicopter transported him from Buxton to Sentara Norfolk General Hospital. He was scheduled to undergo surgery around 8 p.m.

The driver of the Ford, which had Virginia license plates, was taken by ambulance to Chesapeake General Hospital for observation. Her husband, who was in the passenger's seat, was not injured.

The accident occurred about 1:50 p.m. about a mile south of Canadian Hole, just north of Buxton. Traffic was backed up two miles in both directions along the only highway through Hatteras Island. KEYWORDS: ACCIDENT TRAFFIC INJURIES NORTH CAROLINA

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