A Santa Clarita Valley community is grieving after a deadly crash in Colorado involving a local youth hockey team.
Officers with the Colorado State Patrol responded to reports of the crash between a sprinter van and a snowplow on a snowy stretch of Interstate 70 about 55 miles outside Denver just before 9 a.m. Thursday morning, according to the Colorado outlet CPR News.
The sprinter van was carrying the Santa Clarita Lady Flyers 12 and under team, who were in the area for a Western Girls Hockey League tournament, when it crashed head-on into a California Department of Transportation snowplow.
The impact of the crash was so intense that the snowplow’s blade flew off and flipped the van, driven by the father of one of the girls, off the side of the interstate.
A local girls 12 and under hockey club, the Santa Clarita Lady Fliers, was involved in a deadly crash in Colorado while attending a youth hockey tournament on Jan. 29, 2026. (CSP)
First responders pronounced the father deceased at the scene.
One of the young girls was airlifted to a nearby trauma center with critical injuries. Seven other passengers, including four kids and three adults, were driven to local hospitals, CPR News reported.
Three families involved in the hockey club had rented the van together to get the girls to the tournament, KTLA’s Sandra Mitchell reported.
A local girls 12 and under hockey club, the Santa Clarita Lady Fliers, was involved in a deadly crash in Colorado while attending youth hockey tournament on Jan. 29, 2026. (CSP)
A local girls 12 and under hockey club, the Santa Clarita Lady Fliers, was involved in a deadly crash in Colorado while attending youth hockey tournament on Jan. 29, 2026. (CSP)
A local girls 12 and under hockey club, the Santa Clarita Lady Fliers, was involved in a deadly crash in Colorado while attending youth hockey tournament on Jan. 29, 2026. (CSP)
A local girls 12 and under hockey club, the Santa Clarita Lady Fliers, was involved in a deadly crash in Colorado while attending youth hockey tournament on Jan. 29, 2026. (CSP)
A local girls 12 and under hockey club, the Santa Clarita Lady Fliers, was involved in a deadly crash in Colorado while attending youth hockey tournament on Jan. 29, 2026. (CSP)
“It hits everybody hard, it’s just so tragic. There is a child without a parent now,” Santa Clarita Valley hockey mom Kelly Lytle said. “It’s just really disheartening to think about those families.”
At The Cube in Valencia, the team’s home facility, parents were struggling to explain the tragic crash to their daughters.
“She was distraught,” hockey dad Serge Zarubin said of his daughter’s reaction. “It’s understandable. It’s hard for them. It’s hard on grown-ups. It’s even harder for the kids.”
Prescott Littlefield, the Santa Clarita Flyers club president, called the incident a gut punch that’s been difficult to process, but said that the team was being brought closer by the outpouring of support from the community.
“I’ve had countless people reaching out to me asking how they can help, what they can do, even rival hockey clubs,” he said. “We’re just trying to be here and for the families.”
While the young girl airlifted to the hospital remains in critical condition, the four other children involved in the crash have since been released from the hospital.
Of the three adults taken to the hospital, two remain in serious condition, while the third is said to be in fair condition.
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