A Powell woman was injured Monday afternoon when her station wagon was rear-ended by a UPS truck on U.S. Highway 14-A.

Sharon Altermatt, 61, had been heading east on the highway in an older model Subaru when she slowed to turn toward her home on Eaglenest Trail around 3:15 p.m.

“... Then the UPS truck came up behind the vehicle and didn’t see it,” said Wyoming Highway Patrol Trooper Randall Davis. “And it just hit that vehicle from behind.”

The driver of the delivery truck, 27-year-old James Bushnell “was more than likely doing full speed” on the 70 mph highway, while Altermatt is estimated to have slowed down to around 20 or 25 mph, Davis said, stressing that those figures were just a guess. The road was dry at the time.

The truck hit the back of the Subaru with enough force that the station wagon’s rear end wound up “where the rear axle would normally be,” he said. Members of the Powell Volunteer Fire Department had to extricate Altermatt from the vehicle, which caused the vehicle to look even more damaged to those who passed by the scene later.

Altermatt was wearing her seat belt, though she came out of it during the crash and ended up kind of between the front and back seats, Davis said.

“The force of the impact, when you have those impacts like that, a lot of time will kind of break the seat that you’re sitting in,” the trooper explained.

Davis thought Altermatt had suffered a couple broken bones, but wasn’t sure about the extent of her injuries. She was initially taken to Powell Valley Hospital before being taken by ambulance to St. Vincent Healthcare in Billings for further treatment, a Powell hospital spokesman said. Altermatt was released from the Billings facility on Wednesday, a family member said.

Outside of soreness, Bushnell did not report any injuries at the scene, Davis said.

“Both of them would have been more severely injured had they not had their seat belts on,” Davis said, adding, “She [Altermatt] could have been ejected out of the vehicle just from the force of that hit; he [Bushnell] definitely could have went up and hit the windshield or something like that, but thankfully they had their seat belts on.”

Bushnell was issued a misdemeanor citation for following too closely.

(Editor's note: This story has been updated, including to correct when and where Altermatt was hospitalized.)