What started as a girls night out for nine teenagers from Campbellsport ends tragically in a fatal automobile accident. Fond du Lac County Sheriff Mick Fink says three girls were killed early Saturday morning and six others were injured when the 2001 Chevy Tahoe they were in ran off the road at a high rate of speed, entering an icy farm field before flipping and rolling several times.

The girls, who were having a sleep over, went to a restaurant in Fond du Lac and then stopped to toilet paper a friend’s residence near Eden. Fink says there’s no evidence anyone was chasing the girls when the crash occurred. He says “these kids were out basically having, for lack of a better word, a good time” and it turned tragic on them.

AUDIO: Sheriff Mick Fink (:13)

Sheriff’s Lieutenant Rick Olig says the SUV traveled about 700 feet as it was flipping and rolling. Several of the passengers were ejected from the vehicle. Police say two of the three girls killed in the crash were not wearing seat belts. All but one of the girls who survived the crash remain hospitalized.

Results of an investigation will be sent to the district attorney’s office. Alcohol does not appear to have been a factor in the crash.

Fink says an accident like this is something first responders are never truly ready for and it has “shocked the consciousness of us all.”

Bob Nelson, KFIZ

A scare this morning on the UW-Madison campus. Around 9:30 am there were reports of an explosion at the chemistry building. There was, but on the damage scale, it was rather small.

A staffer received non-life threatening injuries after a lab experiment ignited and broke a glass container holding the chemicals. The injury was a cut from the glass.

No fire broke out and no evacuations were needed. In fact, the building remained open except for the lab where the explosion occurred.

Robin Colbert, WIBA

Investigators in Eau Claire County say three teens killed and two others injured in a crash last month were out “hill jumping.”

Deputy Ryan Greening, a crash reconstructionist, says the car was going 80 to 90 miles an hour when it crested a hill, with the goal of getting the vehicle off the ground.

Greening says the vehicle became airborne, traveling through the air for nearly 180 feet before landing again. It swerved off the road, rolled two or three times, and then hit a tree.

Behind the wheel of the vehicle was 14-year-old Austin Gable. The owner of the car, 16-year-old passenger Felicia Bertrang, was in the passenger’s seat. Gable and two other teens died as a result of the crash. Bertrang and another passenger were seriously injured.

Jerry Carpenter, the grandfather of Austin Gable, says the accident continues to haunt the family. He says it’s a “minute to minute survival.”

Eau Claire County Sheriff Ron Cramer says the investigation revealed that “hill jumping” is common, and they hope to raise awareness of the dangerous practice.

AUDIO: Dan Lea reports (:48)