photo by: Douglas County Sheriff's Office

A Douglas County Sheriff's Office vehicle is pictured in January 2022.

A two-vehicle crash south of Lawrence on Sunday afternoon sent two people to the hospital and started a fire.

According the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office, an SUV and a truck hauling a trailer and hay bales were involved in a crash at 1:35 p.m. on U.S. Highway 56 near Globe at East 550 Road. The truck and trailer caught fire.

Other motorists stopped to help, the sheriff’s office said, and two people from the truck and trailer were taken by ambulance to a Kansas City-area hospital with serious injuries. Four other people were checked at the scene and released.

The highway was open at 3:15 p.m. Sunday, but deputies were expected to close it around 4 p.m. so tow trucks could remove the vehicles from the ditch.