BY JOHN PATTERSON
SALISBURY POST

A Durham man traveling with his fiancee and three young children lost control of his Chevrolet Blazer on Wednesday morning on Interstate 85, plowing down an embankment and rolling the vehicle onto its side.

Marlon Hudson, 30, apparently lost control when he turned around to check on a 2-week-old baby in the vehicle’s back seat. Hudson, unable to regain control, ran off the interstate and down an embankment near the Jake Alexander Boulevard overpass, striking a fence and a tree.

Luckily, Hudson and the three children weren’t seriously hurt. But Hudson’s fiancee had to be taken to Rowan Regional Medical Center. Her condition was unknown this morning.

Dennis Snyder, an agriculture teacher at Central Davidson High School, was taking a bus load of students to a greenhouse near Concord. He saw the accident and stopped the bus.

‘‘We had some kids on the bus that were with the fire department and had some training, so they got off and ran down to the accident,’’ Snyder said. ‘‘Some of the girls on the bus took the baby and some other students looked at the woman ... she was in pretty bad shape at first.’’

Snyder said the students tried to calm the children while paramedics worked with Hudson’s fiancee. Some even helped hold equipment for paramedics while they worked with the woman.

‘‘She (Hudson’s fiancee) didn’t look like she was breathing at first,’’ Snyder said. ‘‘But there was a paramedic there that just did a great job ... he worked with her and she looked a lot better when they took her off.’’

Snyder said he was proud of his students.

‘‘They just responded real well,’’ he said. ‘‘They tried to calm everybody. They’re the ones that deserve the credit.’’

D.H. Robinson, the N.C. Highway Patrol trooper who investigated the accident, said everyone in the 1999 Blazer was wearing a seat belt. The vehicle was damaged beyond repair, Robinson said.