Crash left man pinned in ditch for hours

SUNOL -- A Tracy man spent nearly 13 hours in a ravine off State Route 84 on Tuesday night after the truck he was driving went off the road, the California Highway Patrol reported.

Details about what happened were still sketchy on Wednesday, CHP Officer Mike Herman said.

The man, identified as David Gilliam, 30, suffered a broken leg in the accident that occurred on Geary Road, about two miles east of Calaveras Road near Sunol, officials said.

Gilliam was driving an SBC utility truck at the time of the accident, Herman said, adding SBC contacted the CHP at 2:38 p.m. Tuesday to report one of its trucks and drivers missing.

"We received an initial call and went out to see if we could find the truck," Herman said. "We didn't find anything, so we called the dogs back in. Our air units did go out to look for the guy, but we couldn't find him."

Herman said SBC contacted the CHP again shortly before midnight to say they'd activated the Global Positioning System on Gilliam's phone and were picking up a signal in the Sunol area.

"It wasn't until late in the evening that we found him," Herman said.

Crews from SBC, the CHP, the California Department of Forestry and the East Bay Regional Park District took part in the search, officials said.

"It was slightly overcast in the area, which made the search a bit difficult," Herman said.

Shortly after midnight, rescue workers searching along the side of the road heard Gilliam calling for help from down a ravine, Herman said.

"He was about 100 feet down," he said. "He had been ejected from the vehicle and was partially pinned underneath it -- that's why he couldn't reach the truck's radio."

A CDF crew rappelled down the ravine and lifted Gilliam to safety.

He was airlifted to Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley, where he was listed in serious condition on Wednesday.

The cause of the crash remains under investigation, Herman said.

Staff writer Simon Read can be reached at (925) 416-4849, or sread@angnewspapers.com.

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