Three injured when man drives into operating room

A small SUV rammed into the back of the Nevada Surgical Center Thursday morning, smashing through two walls and injuring three people, including one person who was inside the old hospital at the time.

The red Toyota RAV4 clipped the back of a white Jeep Liberty stopped at the border between the Carson Medical Complex's parking and Mountain Street before continuing over a short sign, half a curb and a foot-tall shrub, across the small parking lot behind the old hospital and two walls, according to the Carson City Sheriff's Office.

The SUV stopped at the wall at the far end of the operating room. It went completely through a storage room, Federal Building Services Engineer Jason Haynes said.

The driver was transported by ambulance as a precaution. The passenger in the vehicle was unharmed.

"We heard it (the crash)" Director of Nursing for the Western Nevada Surgical Center Ashley Vazeen said.

It wasn't the first time a car has careened into the center, Administrator Linda Lambrecht said.

A car went through the back of the building in July 2011, she said.

"Last time, it took a couple of days" to repair, she said.

Although the SUV went through two walls, they were "just walls," Haynes said.

"It's nothing serious," and there is no structural damage, he said.

Mountain Street was closed from around 9 until 10:30 a.m., when the sheriff's office reopened the road to traffic.

No one was in the operating room or the supply room at the time of the crash.