Couple who hit moose critical Van Buren accident 1 of 2 last weekend

VAN BUREN – A Madawaska couple who struck a moose Friday night while riding a motorcycle remained in critical condition Monday at a Bangor hospital.

The accident was one of two moose-vehicle accidents that occurred over the weekend.

Eugene Levesque, 45, and his wife, Patricia Levesque, 43, of Madawaska suffered massive head injuries when at about 10:30 p.m., they hit a moose broadside, about six miles north of the Van Buren business district on Route 1.

The couple had serious injuries, but police and medical personnel would not give details about them. The husband and wife were taken from the scene by the Van Buren Ambulance Service and transported to the Cary Medical Center at Caribou. At some point later, they were transported to Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor.

Marie Durant, EMMC spokeswoman, said the couple were still in critical condition Monday afternoon.

Sgt. Jesse Cormier of the Van Buren Police Department said the couple were riding with two other motorcycles northbound on Route 1.

Ronald Sirois and his wife, Brenda, were on a motorcycle following the Levesques. Don Sirois was on the first motorcycle in the group.

“We weren’t going that fast, maybe about 40 miles per hour,” Ronald Sirois said Monday afternoon. “Everything went black, it just exploded in front of me.”

“The first and second bike were about 75 feet apart, and Don [Sirois] didn’t see anything when he went by,” Ronald Sirois recalled. “Eugene’s bike went under the moose, and they flew over it, all landing on the right side of the road.”

Ronald Sirois said the group had left home about 7 p.m. for a ride on a nice evening. They went from Madawaska to Route 161, crossed over to Route 1 through New Sweden and stopped for ice cream in Van Buren. They were on the way home to Madawaska from there.

“I couldn’t understand it when everything went black, so I turned my motorcycle around and saw them in the beam of my headlight,” Don Sirois said. “A trucker stopped to help us.”

He said all six in the group were wearing helmets. He said his friends must have hit the windshield of their motorcycle and flown over the animal they hit. He believed the moose ran across from the right side of the road into the Levesques’ path.

He said the Levesques had massive head injuries.

The Levesques, according to Cormier, were riding a 1984 Yamaha touring bike. Cormier said the couple landed not far from their motorcycle.

The accident happened in a straightaway, just after a curve, a half-mile past a gravel pit near the so-called Turkey Curve area of Van Buren.

The second accident took place in Gouldsboro. A Pennsylvania woman escaped serious injury Sunday night when her car struck a large moose on Route 1, according to the local police chief.

Lorraine Asturino, 52, of Pittsburgh, Pa., was driving on Route 1 a few minutes before 9 p.m. when she drove head on into the animal, Gouldsboro police Chief Guy Wycoff said Monday.

“It went right through the center of the windshield and peeled back the roof of the car,” Wycoff said.

Asturino managed to duck beneath the animal and was slightly injured, according to the chief. She was taken to Maine Coast Memorial Hospital in Ellsworth but has since been released, Wycoff said.

“I don’t think she had time to even slow down,” the chief said. “She’s very lucky.”

Asturino was the only person in the car and was wearing a seat belt during the accident, Wycoff said.

The car, a 1997 Pontiac, was a total loss.

“It was a big mess,” Wycoff said. “It was a big moose.”