A wrong-way driver of a van was killed when his vehicle slammed into a big rig on Interstate 5 in San Joaquin County early Friday, causing the truck to careen through the center divider and hit two more vehicles.

Calls came into dispatchers at about 1:30 a.m. reporting the driver in a van heading southbound in a northbound lane of I-5 near Thornton. The van hit the northbound traveling big rig head on.

The rig then was forced through the center divider and struck two vehicles going southbound, according to a California Highway Patrol spokesman. Minor injuries were reported to the travelers in the southbound lanes and the big rig driver.

The wrong-way driver died. All lanes of the freeway re-opened around 6 a.m.