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A man who died in a car crash on Christmas evening in Mountain View was located by his family Wednesday morning about a half a mile away from the scene of crash, the California Highway Patrol reported.

Officers responded at 6 p.m. to a crash involving a silver 1999 Toyota RAV4 that hit a center divide of northbound state Highway 85 near the Fremont Avenue off-ramp.

CHP Officers from Redwood City and San Jose and firefighters from Mountain View responded to the scene and were unable to locate any victims.

CHP Officer Dave Morey said an investigation found the driver had extricated himself from the Toyota and walked south about half a mile, crossing over a center divide into a southbound lane of the freeway.

He then went up on a freeway embankment and died. The Santa Clara County medical examiner's office identified the man as 40-year-old Alan Willcox of Los Gatos.

His family was notified of the crash on Tuesday night and returned to the scene today to search the area in daylight.


Morey said the family eventually located him in an "extremely concealed spot" in a gully on an elevated embankment. The CHP determined the crash was a fatality this morning and cleared the scene by 11:45 a.m.

"We're kind of trying to stress...we did our due diligence in terms of searching for the party last night," Corey said.

The CHP is still investigating the cause of the crash.