Four others were injured at the Bradenton, Fla. retirement community after an SUV jumped the curb and ran into a group gathered outside the clubhouse after a Sunday-morning worship service. The 79-year-old driver, who apparently lost control after accelerating while backing up, was unhurt, as was her 87-year-old passenger, even though their car ended up partially submerged in a creek embankment. The mobile-home community is located near River Run Golf Links, a municipal course.
A quiet Sunday morning at Sugar Creek Country Club, a Bradenton, Fla. retirement community with about 350 residents, suddenly turned tragic after an accident left three people dead and several others seriously injured on February 2, reported the Sarasota (Fla.) Herald-Tribune.
The victims were hit by a car that backed into them while they gathered after a Sunday-morning worship service held in the clubhouse at Sugar Creek, a 55-and-older neighborhood of neatly maintained manufactured homes, the Herald-Tribune reported.
Sugar Creek’s recreational amenities include a swimming pool and four-lane shuffleboard court, but not a golf course. The property is located just south of River Run Golf Links, a municipal course in Bradenton.
A woman who parked her 2009 Chevrolet Tahoe SUV in one of the few vertical spaces in front of the clubhouse suddenly lost control as she backed up, accidentally accelerated and ran into the crowd, before her vehicle plunged backward through the thick foliage of a nearby creek embankment and becoming partially submerged, the Herald-Tribune reported.
The driver, 79-year-old Doreen E. Lanstra of Palmetto, Fla., and a male passenger, 87-year-old Fred Lanstra of Palmetto, were not injured, it was reported.
The service attracts churchgoers from Sugar Creek as well as adjoining manufactured home communities, who mostly walk to the clubhouse or arrive in golf carts, the Herald-Tribune reported.
The Bradenton, Fla. Herald later reported that troopers with the Florida Highway Patrol said the woman who caused the accident had a valid driver license with no limitations, and that she has not yet been charged with any violations related to the incident.
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