Grim new details have been revealed about the final moments of four California teens killed in fireball crash after they were run off the road by an oncoming car.
A horrific crash in Marin County last Friday evening turned deadly when a Volkswagen Tiguan carrying six teenage girls veered off the road and burst into flames.
Now, a new eyewitness accounts reveal that the teens trapped in the burning SUV were silent before one victim emerged ‘completely on fire’ and then collapsed to the ground.
When good Samaritans Wyatt Smith, 20, and Nicholas Grubb, 18, arrived on the scene, they desperately tried rescuing the girls burning alive inside the vehicle.
Smith and Grubb had been driving at dusk when they spotted the SUV engulfed in flames after striking a tree.
The accident that unfolded on San Geronimo Valley Road near Fairfax left four dead and two critically injured in what witnesses describe as ‘the most horrific, unspeakable thing,’ as reported by the San Francisco Chronicle.
Smith and Grubb told the outlet they immediately pulled over to join bystanders who were frantically trying to access the locked vehicle.
‘I saw the fire creeping up toward the passengers in the front seats, and I knew I had to act fast,’ Grubb told the Chronicle.
Horrifying new details have been revealed about the final moments of four teens killed in fireball crash after being ‘run off road’
Among the victims were Josalynn Osborn and Ada Kepley
Sienna Katz and Olive Koren were also killed in the fiery collision
‘The whole time, I was scared the car would explode in my face.’
‘Once you go through a situation like that you never get those images out of your brain,’ Smith told the outlet. ‘It was the most horrific, unspeakable thing I’ve ever gone through.’
The victims who died were later identified as Olive Koren, Josalynn Osborn, Sienna Katz, and Ada Kepley – all aged between 14 and 16 and students at Archie Williams High School in San Anselmo.
Smith and Grubb emphasized the eerie silence inside the vehicle where six girls sat – two in each of the SUV’s three rows.
Smith desperately searched for rocks to break the windows while another bystander handed Grubb a thick piece of discarded wood, which he used to shatter the glass and force open a door.
The young men managed to help one conscious girl escape before pulling a second victim from the middle row.
‘She was completely unconscious and covered in blood,’ Smith recalled.
The wreck’s two survivors, Elsa Laremont Stranczek and 14-year-old Marley Barclay, remain hospitalized in critical condition.
Marley’s (pictured) parents said their daughter has a ‘long road to recovery.’ The other survivor, Elsa Laremont Stranczek, 16, has not been pictured
The crash unfolded around 7:40pm on Friday in Fairfax, San Francisco, when a car carrying six teen girls was ‘ran off the road’ by another motorist, causing them to collide with a tree
Despite Smith and Grubb’s efforts to save a third girl, they couldn’t free her from her seatbelt as the flames advanced menacingly.
‘Her seat belt had broken in the crash and we couldn’t get it off her — it was trapping her in the car,’ Smith said.
‘By that time, the front driver’s seat and passenger’s seat were completely engulfed in flames.’
Then Smith and Grubb ran between parked cars begging for water to douse the flames.
One driver provided a jug that they poured over a trapped passenger in a desperate attempt to protect her.
But Smith said ‘it didn’t do much, unfortunately.’
When they returned with more water, it was already too late; the entire vehicle had become a fireball.
Then, one of the girls shockingly emerged from the burning wreckage – engulfed in flames.
The parents of the girls said they are ‘grateful to be able to lean on each other during this horrible experience’ as the horror crash shocked their community
‘One girl managed to get out of the car by herself, but she was completely on fire,’ Smith told the outlet. ‘She took a few steps and collapsed.’
Grubb shouted ‘Drop and roll! Drop and roll!’ as bystanders rushed to extinguish the flames on the victim, who was later identified as the driver.
The parents said the girls’ car was ‘run off the road’ by an oncoming car that ‘veered into their lane’, causing the driver of their vehicle to swerve into a tree to avoid a head-on collision.
They added there is ‘no evidence’ that alcohol was involved in the crash, and did not say who was driving.
The driver of the other vehicle has not been identified, and investigations into the crash are still ongoing.
