Crash cleanup

Tuesday, January 14, 2003

Wagner Ford Mercury tow truck operators Rocky Stone (left) and James Huffman (right) (and Lee Dodge, not shown) work to raise a car over the radiator at Rita's Framing Creations in downtown McCook on Tuesday, Jan. 7. Police records indicate the driver of the car, Edith Pettera of Herndon, 91, thought she stepped on the brake as she parked, but instead hit the gas pedal. Pettera's car hit a whiskey-barrel planter on the sidewalk, drove across the sidewalk, jumped the 14-inch building ledge and crashed through plate-glass windows, the window display area and interior double-sliding glass doors. It continued over the store's working iron radiator and dropped into the front showroom, where the car's back bumper caught on the steam radiator and finally stopped. The car's tires laid rubber tracks across the window display's hardwood floor and on the showroom's carpeting. Store owner Rita Messersmith estimated damages to the store and merchandise at $3,000-plus. No one was injured in the incident.

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