Delaware River and Bay Authority Police are investigating an accident that sent one vehicle flying off a “cliff” onto the road below.
Just before 8:00 last evening, rescue crews responded to the I-295 SB off-ramp to Route 13 for reports that a vehicle had gone over the overpass and onto a car below.
Upon their arrival, crews found a man trapped inside his vehicle that had driven off Route 13 northbound and crashed into a vehicle down below.
Witnesses to the accident, Brooke Chase and her friend Chelsea Cropper said they were headed to the beach when Brooke realized she had forgotten her phone. They turned around and just as they exited I-295 heading back into Wilmington they noticed a car was not moving in front of them. As they slowly past the car they realized that the driver was suffering what they thought was a medical episode.
“We saw a car not moving and traffic was just going around it. When we pulled up and passed the car we saw a man basically passed out and touching his face with his mouth open.”, said Chase. Clearly not OK.
Concerned, Chase quickly called 911. While she was on the phone with the dispatchers the driver woke up and began driving towards them. “He was getting closer and closer and we knew he was going to hit us.” It happened, the pair suddenly felt the other car hit them. The man was now pushing them through the heavy traffic. Chelsea tried to get away but she couldn’t. “We couldn’t go left or right so Chelsea drove straight beeping her horn as I waved at the cars to signal that we were in trouble.”, said Chase.
At one point the driver stopped pushing them, scared, the two rolled up the windows, but that didn’t last long, the man continued to push their car. “Suddenly there was a break in traffic, Chelsea veered between the cars and stopped in the median.”, said Chase.
As they looked around they noticed that the car had disappeared. They quickly realized that the man had driven his vehicle off the side of the road and onto the road below. “He drove so far over the cliff that he cleared the entire hill. “, said Chase. The two got out of the car to see what happened and noticed that man had hit another car that was exiting I-295 down below.
Chase said that they watched rescue crews remove the man with jaws of life. She thought the man suffered a broken leg and other injuries but wasn’t sure.
Trooper 4, Delaware State Police Aviation, transported the man to Christian Hospital. Two people in the vehicle that was stuck were uninjured.
Brooke and Chelsea and were not injured in the accident and decided to delay their beach trip until on Saturday morning.