Authorities said Thursday that a driver who crashed and died after speeding the wrong way on a highway in east-central Minnesota north of Mora was a 74-year-old Twin Cities woman.

Kathryn G. Falk, of Plymouth, was reported to emergency dispatch to be traveling north in the southbound lane of Hwy. 65 about 10 miles south of the crash scene on April 24, when she went off the road "at a high rate of speed" to the left, said Kanabec County Sheriff Brian Smith.

The vehicle kept going through a ditch, hit a utility pole and then a driveway approach, the sheriff said. That sent the vehicle airborne for about 100 feet before it struck a fence and landed in a field, he said.

Falk was "able to speak with both the people that found the crash and the deputy" on the scene, Smith said. "She did seem confused about where she was and if anyone was with her."

Falk was hospitalized at HCMC and died there on April 30 from injuries suffered in the crash, the Hennepin County Medical Examiner's Office said Thursday.

Paul Walsh • 612-673-4482