At least seven people, including two children, were injured Friday morning in a two-vehicle crash that sent a car to an open-air restaurant in Manhattan, police said.
The destruction of the chain reaction occurred just after 8:30 a.m. when a white van crashed into a black sedan and sent the car to the dining area at the intersection of East 50th Street and Second Avenue.
The van, which was traveling south on Second Avenue, was continuing ahead, plowing into a fruit stand, sources said.
Witnesses said the van began getting into things between 51st and 50th Street East, before stopping at 49th Street East.
Juan Carlos Quispe, 44, said his brother, who was waiting at 50 East Street and Second Avenue at the time, was about to be mowed down.
“My brother said, ‘Hey Carlos, it’s an accident,'” said Quispe, who was coming from Third Avenue. “When I came, I saw two small children on the sidewalk. They were scared.
They were shaking. I didn’t see any blood. “
Quispe said he saw an Asian woman lying on her back near 49th and Second Avenues.
“It was shaking, shaking,” he recalled. “I had my eyes closed. He seemed to be in pain. The ambulance came and took her away. People said it would be good because it moved my hands and legs. “
He added about his brother: “Thank God, he is fine. He could have been hit. “
Videos from the Citizen app show the dramatic consequences: piles of rubbish scattered at the intersection just outside a Starbucks, as well as a traffic light and a street sign that were torn down.
Airbags were deployed inside the sedan, which suffered damage to the front.
A driver was arrested and may have been under the influence, police said.
The FDNY said seven people – five adults and two children – were taken to Bellevue Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
One suffered a hip fracture, while the children suffered abrasions from the flying debris, sources said.
There was no one in the outdoor dining area at the time of the crash, police said.
