JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A 6-year-old girl was ejected from a car Wednesday when it crashed head on with a tractor-trailer on Normandy Boulevard, according to the Florida Highway Patrol.
FHP Sgt. Dylan Bryan said the car, which was carrying two adults and three children, was driving westbound on Normandy Boulevard about 9:30 a.m. and crossed the center lane for unknown reasons near Winding Mare Boulevard, west of Yellow Water Road. The car hit a semi head on and was then hit by a Nissan.
Serena Williams, 6, was ejected from the car and was flown to UF Health Jacksonville with critical but non-life-threatening injuries.
The two other children, 9-year-old Evan Biggs and 5-year-old Hayden Williams, were also taken to the hospital with minor injuries. The driver, 25-year-old David Huot, was taken to the hospital with serious injures. None of them were wearing seat belts.
"I'm not going to say that's surprising, but it's certainly discouraging for us to see, especially when we respond to traffic crashes such as this and others that happen in our area," Bryan said. "Children are along for the ride. They follow the examples that they're given and the instruction that they're given. So at that age, especially a young age, we would certainly expect the parental guardians or the legal guardians to provide a better example."
The front passenger in the car, 30-year-old Leighanne Nicole Black, the driver of the semi, 61-year-old Robert Stanley Aronofsky, and the driver of the Nissan, 37-year-old Dontrell Lavar Conley, were not injured. They were all wearing seat belts, according to the FHP report.
Aronofsky and several witnesses were cooperating with troopers in the investigation, Bryan said.
All lanes in both directions on Normandy Boulevard at Fiftone Road were closed while the crash was investigated.