Motorcyclist, driver killed in separate crashes: police

A motorcyclist and a Hyundai driver were killed in separate single-vehicle crashes within minutes of each other early Saturday as the NYPD ramps up enforcement against drunk and impaired drivers during Memorial Day weekend, police said.

The road carnage began about 4:20 a.m. in Staten Island when a Hyundai Elantra slammed into the back of a parked tractor-trailer on Narrows Road North, a service road to the Staten Island Expressway in Rosebank.

An unidentified man was found behind the wheel with a severe head injury, cops said. He died at the scene.

The tractor-trailer was unoccupied and no other injuries were reported.

The Hyundai was heading west along Narrows Road North at a high rate of speed when the driver struck the back of the tractor-trailer, police said. Cops were trying to identify the driver Saturday.

About 10 minutes away in Elmhurst, Queens, a 22-year-old motorcyclist crashed on the east-bound Long Island Expressway near Queens Blvd., cops said.

Cops responding to the 4:30 a.m. crash found the victim crumpled on the asphalt with significant body injuries. He, too, died at the scene, cops said.

The man’s name was not immediately disclosed as cops track down family members.

Police said the victim was traveling alone when he lost control of the motorcycle. He was thrown off the motorcycle as it fell to the ground.

On Friday night, about six and a half hours before the early-morning crashes, an auto struck a bicyclist pedaling along Nostrand Ave. near Ave. R in Sheepshead Bay, cops said. The bicyclist was taken to the hospital and is expected to survive, cops said. Details of the crash were not immediately disclosed.

Saturday’s crash marked the second time in two weeks that a motorcyclist died on city roads, cops said.

On May 14, Edwin Febus, 57, crashed his motorcycle into a Honda Accord making a U-turn on E. 103rd St. near Glenwood Road in Canarsie, Brooklyn, cops said.

EMS rushed him to Brookdale University Hospital, where he died four days later.

Saturday’s crashes occurred just hours after the NYPD vowed to crack down on speeders and drunk and impaired drivers navigating the roads on Memorial Day weekend, the unofficial start of summer.

During a press conference on Friday, NYPD Chief of Transportation Kim Royster said highway patrol units would be “laser-focused” on impaired drivers.

“The NYPD will step up enforcement to make sure all of our road users enjoy a safe Memorial Day weekend,” Royster said. “Police officers assigned to the seventy-seven precincts will be extra vigilant in removing impaired drivers from our local streets. Traffic safety is public safety.”

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The holiday crackdown against speeding and impaired driving is expected to continue through early Tuesday, police said.

On Friday night, a New York state trooper shot and wounded a suspected drunk driver who refused to be pulled over sparking a pursuit along the Grand Central Parkway in Corona, officials said.

As the pursuit ended near a Gulf gas station just off the highway near LaGuardia airport, the trooper got out of his vehicle and shot at the driver, claiming the motorist was trying to run him over.

The driver was taken to the hospital with a non-life-threatening wound.

As of Thursday, cops had investigated 84 driving fatalities this year, one less than this time last year.

Cops have seen a slight jump in motorcyclist deaths, from seven last year to nine this year, and the number of motor vehicle driver deaths remained the same at 12, according to NYPD statistics.

But the number of bicycle deaths has jumped fourfold this year — from three last year to 13, cops said.