Two people were killed and two others were hurt when a wrong-way driver crashed head-on into another vehicle on northbound Interstate 680 in Concord, just south of Willow Pass Road, shortly before 2 a.m. Monday, Oct. 19, the California Highway Patrol said.

Why it matters: The crash shut every northbound lane of one of Contra Costa County's busiest freeways for more than four hours, and it is the second wrong-way crash on a Concord freeway in just over a week.

What happened

The first calls came in at about 1:50 a.m., according to the CHP incident log published by Contra Costa News. A caller reported a car going southbound in the northbound lanes and said the driver turned the headlights off as the caller got close. Within minutes, callers reported a head-on crash between two vehicles in the middle lanes near the Lazy Dog restaurant, with one vehicle sideways across the road.

Firefighters from the Contra Costa County Fire Protection District and several AMR ambulances responded, and callers told dispatchers it sounded as if crews were cutting someone out of a vehicle. The log shows two people were confirmed dead at the scene. The Contra Costa County Sheriff's Office was called in for the coroner's response.

Two injured people were taken to John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek, CBS San Francisco and Patch reported. Entries in the CHP log describe one with a broken leg and internal injuries and the other with a broken leg.

An early entry in the CHP log noted that the wrong-way driver had been drinking. That is a preliminary note from the scene, not a finding. The CHP has not announced an arrest or said what caused the crash, and it has not released the names of the people who died.

Freeway closure and detour

CHP officers started a full closure of northbound I-680 at about 2:02 a.m. and sent traffic onto Highway 242. For a time only one lane, the far-right No. 6 lane near Highway 242, stayed open, according to the log. All lanes were back open by about 6:19 a.m., the CHP told CBS San Francisco, just ahead of the Monday morning commute.

A pattern of wrong-way crashes

On the evening of Saturday, Oct. 10, a car fleeing a chase went the wrong way on Highway 4 west of Willow Pass in Concord and hit a Jeep head-on. Read our report on the Highway 4 crash. Early Sunday, a fatal crash involving as many as eight vehicles also shut southbound I-880 at Mission Boulevard in Fremont.

This story will be updated when the CHP or the Contra Costa County coroner releases more details.