A Smashing Good Time!
From the Vienna Times on 08/29/2007:
Police remove a window frame from the front of the Vienna Alfa Shoe & Luggage Repair shop after a Lincoln Town Car crashed through the store's front wall. Before police began winching the vehicle free, only the very end of the car's trunk protruded from the smashed shell of the store. A Vienna man has been charged with reckless driving after crashing his Lincoln Town Car into a local shoe repair store. Witnesses say that shortly after noon on Aug. 29, an older Vienna man was traveling southbound on Park Street in Vienna at around 30 miles per hour when he abruptly made a right hand turn into the parking lot of Alfa Shoe and Luggage repair, located at 105 Park St SE. The vehicle crashed through the glass front wall of the store and traveled all the way inside, crushing interior walls, shelves and a large machine used in the store's business before coming to a stop. Although the store was open for business and the owners were inside, no one was hurt in the incident. Lauri McGee, owner of the laser hair removal shop above Alfa shoe repair, saw the crash and said the large car was traveling at least 30 miles an hour when he hit the store. "It was so loud, there was a big cloud of smoke, and glass flew everywhere. ... People had just walked out of the store when it happened," McGee said. Brothers Greg and Sarkis Mousessian, the owners of Alfa shoe repair, were in a back room of the store when it happened. "The building shook. I thought a bomb had gone off in the store," Greg Mousessian said. "I'm happy actually, happy that no one was hurt," Sarkis Mousessian said. Judging by the fate of a large machine that was thrown across the store by the force of the car crash, the Mousessians said they have little doubt that anyone in the room when the car hit would have been seriously injured. Still, they fear the accident could still claim a casualty. "This will kill our business," said Greg Mousessian. "People will be afraid to come here when they see what happened."
A picture:
Comments
Holy smokes! Thank goodness no one was hurt.
Posted by: vienna mommy | August 30, 2007 04:00 PM
It is indeed fortunate that no one was killed! I wonder if the driver was trying to avoid the nightmare parking lot that is Noodles & Co., Chipotle, etc...how did that parking "deal" ever get approved? Clearly there was NEVER enough parking for those businesses at the get go!
Posted by: ewh | August 30, 2007 04:11 PM
This person had to have gone out of their way to hit this building. With the road being parallel to the building I don't see how they did this.
Posted by: Frank | August 30, 2007 06:16 PM
How old was he? Who was he? Seems like the papers are leaving details out. Was he a Vienna poll worker?
Posted by: HV | August 30, 2007 07:02 PM
"76-year-old Nassar Matini of Vienna" according to the Sun Gazette. The article says he was pulling into the parking lot and hit the gas instead of the brake.
Posted by: smash | August 31, 2007 04:20 PM
Let's open more outdoor eating places without barriers?
The demolition of Alph Shoe Repair shop is at least the third runaway auto I have seen in Vienna. One was at the gas station near Park St. when an auto raced from one station to the other at a high speed across Park St only to be stopped by a pole. Fortunately no was injured other than the driver of the vehicle. The second was at the Cedar Lane shopping center when a person drove off the parking lot across the road into a building pillar at CVS Pharmacy. Again no one was injured.
Are we lucky?
Posted by: Wyltn | September 1, 2007 05:39 PM
There was also one where an older driver went up the embankment of the post office from Church Street.
Posted by: scary | September 3, 2007 11:02 AM
Is it only a matter of time until Maud veers off Maple Avenue and hits the Town Green Fountain?
Posted by: Mad Maud | September 3, 2007 07:03 PM
I couldn't help but notice at the corner of Church & Lawyers (but on Church) the fence at the funeral home & a bush along the street was obviously hit by a car.
Was this ANOTHER accident at that intersection? Is this a monthly occurrence now?
Posted by: vienna mommy | September 4, 2007 02:22 PM