Updated at 12:35 p.m. Monday

Douglas County sheriff’s deputies were called early Monday to the scene of a fatal accident on the 23rd Street exit ramp off westbound Kansas Highway 10 outside of Lawrence.

The crash involved a single occupant of the vehicle. Deputies were dispatched around 3 a.m., and the exit ramp remained blocked pending investigation of the crash.

Geroge Diepenbrock, a spokesman for the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office, told the Journal-World that a preliminary investigation showed the driver of the vehicle veered off into the west ditch of the exit ramp and struck a bridge pillar on the driver’s side.

While first responders investigated the wreck, drivers westbound on K-10 were advised to seek alternate routes to Lawrence, including the Haskell Avenue exit. The exit ramp had reopened later Monday morning.

The wreck was the first of two fatal wrecks on the highway in or near Lawrence. The second occurred around 11 a.m. on the eastbound side of the highway near the exit ramp of East 1900 Road, between Lawrence and Eudora.