A Florida beach toll booth attendant was killed when a pickup truck slammed into her station before driving into the ocean.
Tammy Jo Baker, 63, a longtime employee of Volusia County, Florida, was working as a beach parking contractor when the truck crashed through her toll booth and into the ocean in Daytona Beach Shores around 12:40 p.m. Monday.
“I think she was probably close to being killed on impact,” Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood said during a Monday press conference. “That booth isn’t made of anything, if you look at it. And you hit that thing at 40 miles an hour; there’s really nowhere to go. And it flipped the booth around, the force of that.”
Despite immediate life-saving efforts from lifeguards on the beach, Baker died from her injuries at the scene, Chitwood said.
“It’s so senseless,” Chitwood said, later noting that the incident could have been much worse.
“If this was a Saturday afternoon. If this was this past weekend. How many other people could have been killed or injured?” he questioned.
The driver, identified as 36-year-old Deanna Harrell of Ormond Beach, Florida, has been detained. A crash investigation is underway.
Chitwood said witnesses saw Harrell drive the truck into the ocean. The witnesses who pulled her out of the vehicle said it seemed as though she was trying to drive away, but her truck got stuck in the sand.
Officials said Monday evening that Harrell had been taken into custody under Florida’s Baker Act, which allows authorities to hold a person in the midst of a mental health crisis.
She is also being tested for alcohol intoxication.
“I can just tell you, being up at the truck, there’s a heavy odor — for me — a heavy odor of alcohol you can smell from the passenger side of the vehicle,” Chitwood said. “We’ll see how that works out.”
The Dunlawton beach access ramp, where the crash unfolded, will remain closed until further notice, officials said.
