NEW YORK — Longtime “60 Minutes” correspondent Bob Simon, who covered most major overseas conflicts and news stories since the late 1960s during a five-decade career in journalism, died in a car crash. He was 73.

Simon’s assignments according to his executive producer, took him from the Vietnam War to the Oscar-nominated movie “Selma.” He spent years doing foreign reporting for CBS News, particularly from the Middle East, where he was held captive for more than a month in Iraq two decades ago.

A town car in which Simon was a passenger Wednesday night hit another car stopped at a Manhattan traffic light and then slammed into metal barriers separating traffic lanes, police said. Simon and the town car’s driver were taken to a hospital, where Simon was pronounced dead.

The town car driver suffered injuries to his legs and arms. The driver of the other car was uninjured. Police were continuing to investigate the accident.