Salem police responded Wednesday night to a report of a young boy being struck by a van leaving the fireworks display.

Reports say that around 9:30 p.m. Wednesday night, an 11-year-old Salem boy ran from Bryan Memorial Park into the path of a van driven by 82-year-old Elwood Hays, also of Salem.

The boy was initially taken to Salem Township Hospital before being airlifted to a St. Louis area hospital for treatment of non-life threatening head injuries.

According to witnesses, the van was traveling about 10 to 20 miles per hour at the time and could not have avoided hitting the boy.

Traffic in the area was very heavy at the time.

No citations were given. But a state police crash reconstructionist has been called in to further investigate in crash.

The crash resulted in Route 37 being closed for about an hour, leading to even heavier traffic for the already congested area.