Police Make Quick Arrests After Rocks Smash Into Moving Cars From Overpass
Posted September 29, 2006 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Sandra Estrela was still shaking hours after someone hurled soccer ball-sized rocks through her windshield as she drove beneath an overpass at Lawrence and Weston Road early Friday morning.
Police quickly arrested two teenaged suspects, but the effects of their foolishness were still lingering in the rattled driver who was blindsided by a potentially deadly downpour of debris.
“I didn’t see anything,” Estrela recalled. “I only felt it. Like I only felt it because glass just shattered all over me. So I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t know if I got shot. I didn’t know what happened.”
The frightening incident took place around 4:35am. Police were called after early rising motorists were startled by boulders suddenly crashing into their windshields.
At least two cabs and a van were hit, leaving large cracks in windshields and sending shards of glass into the front seats.
“I didn’t know that it was a rock,” Estrela adds. “I was looking … to see if I was hurt. I didn’t know what it was.
“I’m sure if I was in the passenger seat, all that glass, it just wisped over my face so if I was in that passenger seat, I don’t know how much glass would have gone into my eyes.”
Somehow, the projectiles only damaged the cars themselves and not those inside. Police are saying it could have been a lot worse.
Two young males, one 18, the other 17, have been arrested and charged with mischief and endangering life
Their actions are eerily reminiscent of another similar incident that didn’t end quite so happily.
Last February, the city was stunned when a giant rock shattered the windshield of a 28-year-old teacher. Nadia McLean was driving some family members home from a wedding when a boulder crashed into the driver’s side of her car.
Only the intervention of her brother prevented the vehicle from getting into a serious crash on the 401.
The bride-to-be required extensive plastic surgery and she was forced to temporarily leave her job as she recovered from her injuries. She has since married and is on a long road to recovery. A 17-year-old was later arrested for the senseless crime.
