LOS ANGELES (AP) -- According to the Associated Press,  a  truck carrying a prison inmate wildfire crew collided head-on with a car on a narrow highway north of Los Angeles, killing an inmate and the driver of the car and injuring 12 other occupants, authorities said.

Authorities are investigating why the elderly man driving the Subaru wagon with Nevada plates veered across the yellow line on Tuesday, triggering a crash that caused the truck to overturn on Highway 138 near Interstate 5 south of Gorman, California Highway Patrol spokesman David Lutz said.

The Subaru driver, whose name has not been released, was pronounced dead at the scene.

The dead inmate, Fernando Sanchez, 25, set for parole in 2012 was ejected out of the back of the truck.  He was from San Diego County and had been sent to prison for possession and sale of narcotics, California prisons spokesman George Kostyrko said.

Fire Capt. Mark Savage said when the first rescue engine arrived at the scene of the accident that three of the inmates were pinned underneath the truck.  A truck towing a forklift happened to be caught in the traffic backed up by the crash and firefighters asked the truck driver to unload the forklift that freed inmates.