Background: Isolated odontoid type III fractures are usually stable with surgical fixation reserved for significant fracture displacement or inability to maintain alignment with external immobilization. We present a rare but important pattern of injury involving a C2 fracture with C1 and C2 distraction behaving as a variant of occipital-cervical dissociation. Methods: Case Report Results: An 88-year-old female was involved in a motor vehicle accident and was transferred to a trauma centre from a peripheral hospital intubated. She was diagnosed with a significant injury to the C2 vertebral body with distraction between C1 and C2, which is a variant of an occipital-cervical dissociation. This patient had significant facial injuries, a zygomatic fracture, multiple lacerations, and a pulmonary contusion. Her ISS (Injury Severity Score) was greater than 16. She was however from a spine perspective neurologically intact. She required stabilization in the form of an occiput-cervical fusion. Conclusions: We present a polytrauma patient with a C2 distraction type injury and atlantoaxial dissociation manifesting more like an occipital-cervical dissociation injury with very good pre-operative imaging. These injury patterns are critical to recognize as they are unstable requiring occiput-cervical fusion instead of a cervical fusion alone which is reserved for some cases of odontoid Type III fractures.