BATH TOWNSHIP, Ohio — A 46-year-old Bluffton man was killed on Saturday evening, November 7, when his pickup truck left Sandusky Road in Bath Township, struck a parked car, overturned several times and hit two trees, the Ohio State Highway Patrol said. Nathan Ulrey was not wearing a safety belt and was ejected from the vehicle. He was pronounced deceased at the scene. The crash, reported to the patrol's Lima Post at about 5:30 p.m., remains under investigation.
Source: Ohio State Highway Patrol release via WLIO / The Lima News
The patrol's account, published by WLIO and The Lima News and also carried by the Bluffton Icon, is specific about the sequence. Ulrey was driving a 2002 Chevrolet Silverado west on Sandusky Road in Allen County when the truck drove off the right side of the roadway. It struck a parked car, overturned several times and struck two trees. The Silverado sustained severe damage and was towed from the scene by A and D Towing. Ulrey's body was transported to the Montgomery County Morgue by Allen County Mortuary Services.
Source: The Fostoria Free Press, reproducing the OSP release
Who responded to Sandusky Road
The Ohio State Highway Patrol's Lima Post is leading the investigation. Assisting at the scene were Bath Township Fire, Bath Township EMS, A and D Towing, the Allen County Coroner's Office and Allen County Mortuary Services, the patrol said. That list reflects how a fatal rural crash is handled in Ohio: troopers document and reconstruct the scene, township fire and EMS crews work the roadside response, the coroner's office takes responsibility for the deceased, and the vehicle is removed once investigators release it.
What is not yet known
The patrol has not said why the Silverado left the right side of the roadway — whether speed, a medical event, a mechanical failure, distraction, impairment or road conditions played any role is exactly what the investigation is meant to establish, and none of it has been announced. The reports did not specify whether the parked car was occupied or describe any other injuries, and the time given, about 5:30 p.m., is the patrol's response time; the exact time of the crash was not released. Awaaz Punjab is not speculating on any of those points.
The seat belt fact at the centre of the release
One fact the patrol stated plainly, and then underlined, is that Ulrey was not wearing his safety belt and was ejected from the vehicle. The release closed with the patrol's reminder to motorists to always wear a seat belt. Ejection is the deadliest outcome a crash can have for an occupant, and it is the outcome a belt is specifically designed to prevent — which is why troopers put the belt fact and the reminder in the same short release, and why this report leads its safety section with them rather than with anything investigators have not yet established.
Bath Township, Bluffton and the Lima corridor
Bath Township is a township in Allen County in northwestern Ohio, just east of Lima, the county seat and the largest city in this part of the state. Bluffton, Ulrey's home community, is a village that straddles Allen and Hancock counties about 20 miles northeast of Lima, known locally for Bluffton University. Sandusky Road is a rural township road — the kind of two-lane route that carries farm, school and commuter traffic between these communities, including the trucks and pickups that are everyday vehicles in this part of Ohio. Crashes on such roads are investigated by the Highway Patrol's local post, in this case Lima, rather than by a city police department.
Why this matters to our readers
A large share of Awaaz Punjab's readers in the United States drive for a living or commute long distances on rural two-lane roads, and the Punjabi trucking community runs corridors across Ohio — I-75, which passes directly through Lima and Bluffton, among them. The verified lesson of this release is narrow and practical, and it comes from the troopers themselves: on a Saturday evening rural drive, a single departure from the roadway became a fatal ejection, and the one protective step the patrol identified was the safety belt Ulrey was not wearing.
The Lima Post's investigation continues. Watch for the patrol's findings on why the Silverado left Sandusky Road, the Allen County Coroner's Office process through the Montgomery County Morgue, and any funeral or memorial arrangements the family chooses to make public. No charges are involved in a single-vehicle fatal crash investigation of this kind unless investigators find a further cause.
Awaaz Punjab's condolences are with Nathan Ulrey's family and the Bluffton community. This story will be updated if the Highway Patrol releases its investigative findings. It is based on the Ohio State Highway Patrol Lima Post release of November 7, 2026, as published by WLIO / Hometown Stations, The Lima News and the Bluffton Icon, with additional summary reporting by the Shelby News Reporter.
Source: Shelby News Reporter