Florida Turnpike Car Crash Fatally Injures Two Men in Lake County

By Orlando Personal Injury Attorney on August 29, 2021

Deputies with the Florida Highway Patrol are currently working in conjunction with local Lake County authorities to determine the exact cause of a deadly auto accident between two motorists that claimed the lives of two men and injured one child late Friday evening along the Florida Turnpike.

According to preliminary collision reports from officers with the Florida Highway Patrol operating within Lake County, it was close to 10 p.m. on August 27, 2021, when a 31-year-old tow truck driver from Orlando was sent out to assist a vehicle that had suffered a mechanical malfunction and was currently parked on the right shoulder of the Florida Turnpike near mile marker 281. As the wrecker pulled over to the side of the road, the operator/driver illuminated the truck’s emergency lights and began the process of hooking up the stranded car.

It was while the tow truck driver was working to help the disabled vehicle that a pickup truck with a 51-year-old male driver from Ocala and a female juvenile passenger entered the area from the northbound direction. For reasons that are unknown at this time, the driver of the pickup truck veered across the tollway and crashed violently into the tow truck and its operator. The force of impact from the accident was so severe that it caused the pickup truck to overturn; an action that ejected the 51-year-old Ocala driver from his vehicle.

Lake County 9-1-1 workers received the first set of distress calls referencing the truck crash shortly after it happened and troopers from the Florida Highway Patrol were immediately dispatched to the scene of the accident. Upon their arrival, they were able to quickly determine that the 31-year-old tow truck operator and the 51-year-old pickup truck driver had sustained fatal injuries during the collision and had already passed away. The only survivor in this tragic incident was a juvenile female passenger who was transported to Arnold Palmer Children’s Hospital in Orlando for treatment of undisclosed critical injuries.

Formal charges have yet to be filed in this case, however, an investigation into this accident has since been opened by detectives with the Florida Highway Patrol. It is unlikely that anyone will face legal ramifications since the sole survivor is an underage, innocent victim who was not operating the vehicle when the collision occurred.

James O. Cunningham

Since 1977, personal injury lawyer James Cunningham has provided effective legal advocacy to people who are injured through the negligent actions of another person or entity throughout the Central Florida area. He fights to obtain recoveries for his clients’ physical and emotional pain and suffering and pursues his clients’ personal injury cases with a commitment to excellence and impeccable preparation.