ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – An 18-year-old Orlando student, the star quarterback of his high school team, was killed and two other people were seriously injured early Sunday when a pickup truck was hit by a sedan as the student tried to pull a vehicle stuck on the side of a road in Orange County, according to the Florida Highway Patrol.
The FHP confirmed Sunday evening that 18-year-old Nick Miner, a student at East River High School, died in the crash.
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The fatal wreck occurred around 1:05 a.m. on Dallas Boulevard just south of Oberly Parkway, troopers said.
As Miner attempted to pull another driver’s pickup truck back onto the roadway from the east shoulder, a 27-year-old Orlando woman traveling northbound on Dallas Boulevard did not notice the stopped vehicles and collided with the front left side of the pickup, causing the truck to overturn onto the east shoulder and strike two pedestrians who were standing nearby, the FHP said.
A 20-year-old Orlando woman and a 17-year-old Cocoa girl were taken to a hospital with serious yet non-life-threatening injuries, the FHP report stated.
We will have grief counselors available on campus first thing in the morning for any student or staff member who needs to speak with someone about this loss.
— East River HS (@EastRiverHS) October 23, 2022
Please keep our students and staff in your thoughts at this very difficult time. Thank you for your support. pic.twitter.com/tHXI1O3YT9
Miner was ejected from the pickup as it overturned and suffered fatal injuries, troopers said.
“They called me. It was devastating,” said Arlin Wadsworth, a friend of Miner. “I didn’t know what to do. I just wished we all could have helped him more, but there’s nothing we really could have done.”
Wadsworth added he was with Miner the whole day leading up to the fatal crash.
“I just can’t go back and see him anymore. He’s just gone,” Wadsworth said. “Great person. He was always willing to help all his friends. Always willing to help out anybody... He was trying to pull out our friend and it just cost him his life.”
A 17-year-old Orlando boy in the stuck pickup truck was not injured in the crash, and the woman who drove the sedan suffered minor injuries, troopers said.
An investigation of the fatal crash remains active and charges are pending at time of writing, the report states.
“They come here 80 to 100 miles an hour down the road, just zooming past us. Our friends have all these lights all over their trucks, I would have figured that they would have seen the truck and everything because it’s all lit up,” Wadsworth said. “It’s definitely going to be hard for the whole football team, because anybody on that football team, he was our (quarterback).”
Grief counselors will be available Monday at East River High School.
The family has set up a GoFundMe to assist with funeral costs.
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