E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSSFour teenagers were killed in a single-vehicle crash in California's Kern County on Monday.
All of the dead were from Oakland, Calif. Three of the four had the same last name, according to the Kern County coroner. It is believed they were cousins.
The coroner said Maria Moa, 17, David Moa, 19, George Moa 19, and Rachel Fisiiahi, 19, died when the car they were in went out of control and rolled multiple times while on State Route 58 in Kern County, just outside California City.
Police said George Moa was driving a 2004 GMC Yukon when he lost control. It was the only car involved in the crash.
The vehicle rolled multiple times, according to investigators, who said two of the occupants were ejected from the vehicle. All four died at the scene.
A fifth occupant survived the crash and was transported to Antelope Valley Hospital. That person's name was not released.
Police did not list a possible cause for the crash. There was no mention of speed or if there was any evidence drugs or alcohol at the crash scene. The crash happened at 1:55 p.m. Monday.
A spokesman for the Oakland Unified School District said at least one of the victims was a recent graduate of Castlemont High School. Spokesman Troy Flint said the district has made counselors available to students who are upset by the tragedy.
Leave a Comment:
How tragic that four young lives have been lost. It seems apparent, at least for two, that no seat belts were used. I just don't understand why such precious lives were lost in this needless manner. Because the choice was made not to use a piece of safety equipment. One would think, at their age, it would be a simple matter. Yet how awful, that option was not chosen and now their families must live with the consequences and burying a child. The worst thing any parent must face, as any parent surely understands and can sympathize with during this nightmare for each family facing such an issue.
In addition, how many parents are now asking, what more could have been done? Or going replaying that "if only" guilty scenario over and over in their minds. I pray those who have died are at peace, that those who mourn, will have the support and strength needed to help carry the great burden of loss they now bear, and they find peace and comfort in the memories of the love they share for their child. While that individual still injured, makes a quick and full recovery.
Good morning and hope you have a good day Windy...
Yes, sad all the way around. "Especially" with three of them from the same family. RIP.
This is one of the "many" greatest fears I have for my children.
Take care...
Good morning Creek Dog, hope you have a nice day as well.
You share the same worries so many other parents carry, including myself. My son had a bicycle he used for work, and ended up being hit TWICE,one during the day, second near evening, that one by a hit and run driver. Despite reflectors, lights,he literally turning his bike into the ditch to avoid the car, and no other cars taking up the road. Found the driver the next day living nearby, from the damage to his car.No more bike riding.
I hate these stories, they bring back some awful memories and young lives lost needlessly. I have worked many an accident, and I always dreaded those which involved the young victims. One accident, practically my first, involved five teenagers in a small pickup truck, none wearing a seat belt. It took me a long time to finally get over one kid who got wrapped up in a barb wired fence. when thrown.Going to schools to try to educate kids, one hopes you reach some of these kids, to prevent more deaths.
The sense of immortality that practically every youth has, is so very difficult to try to break through and help kids understand they can be killed. Their brains literally are wired incapable of understanding until they get to be in their twenties. Until then, all a parent can do, is hope their child will trust the love of that relationship, to listen and buckle up.Ahead of the impulsiveness to just do what they want at the moment.Unfortunately, it often takes losing a close friend, before many learn the hard way.
I'm betting speed was a factor.
oh ya think Columbo?
I've never unbuckled a corpse.
Vern,
If you're lucky, maybe one day you'll have the chance however, it will be very difficult while being dead.
HUH....!
Don't understand the posts myself RANKNFILE.
Vern - I've unbuckled a near corpse. The bolts holding the seat to the floor pulled out on impact, and since the seatbelt automatically locked, the woman was nearly cut in half by the seatbelt. She was quite literally wrapped around the seatbelt across her chest. Yes, seat belts do save lives but they can also take them.
Think it means "buckle-up".... there are always exceptions to the rule.... but buckle-up is your best bet to survive a crash.....
To make myself clear, Vern's original post was obnoxious. Basically joking about 4 dead teens from a car accident. Anyhow, it seems that way.
My post was pointing out the fact that he would have a hard time unbuckling "himself" while dead, behind the wheel, seat-belted in. In other words, Karma... He'll get his chance....
Think outside the box...
AvgJoeTX
You do have a valid point there however, I would also think that if the seat-belt killed you in the manner in which you say, then you would've most likely died with or without a seat-belt from such a serious impact. Just my observation.
Creek Dog,
You're being way too sensitive. I took his post to simply mean that seatbelts save lives. I didn't see anything obnoxious about it.
Just where is the outcry about banning people from being in a auto without using the seatbelts? And why do they have those large capicity vehicles? They also need to be banned, that way not so many people would be at risk of dying when the vehicle had an accident.
If that above rant sounds somewhat familiar, just change a couple of the words to weapons and magazines and you have the same rant. Yes, it's stupid, but done to prove a point. There are already laws about seatbelt using, why wasn't that enforced?
I do feel sorry for the family's involved for their loss of loved ones. Hopefully the one in the hospital will pull through from the injuries suffered.
Should we also ban buses, trains, ships, and airplanes because so many are carried in them at one time?
Are you aware that they don't make cars with passive seatbelt systems anymore? The reason is that they were attached to the door and during a rollover accident, the doors usually came open and the occupant was ejected anyways. I was one of the first on the scene of such a crash. No doors on the car and everyone inside was slung all over the highway.
@beenthere, is your question real, or just trying to be funny? I will go with the funny part as non of them will be banned, right? But if you re-read my comment, you should be able to understand what point I was trying to make. And I did make a point with my comment.
Not to mention holding GMC accountable for building such vehicles of slaughter!
They must pay for this tragedy!
Oh, sorry. Well the reason you don't hear a loud cry for seat belt laws and more media coverage of traffic deaths is that:
...it doesn't forward the liberal agenda of gun control and eventual confiscation.
...it doesn't build public fear and misinformed support for this agenda.
peteMT, you hit the nail right on the head! Unbelievable how the liberals can't see a comparison and how rediculous their aganda sounds!
Whats unbelievable is morons making the death of 4 teenagers all about gun control and liberal bashing. Pathetic.
tag - no, what's pathetic is your resorting to name calling.
Character. Stay classy.
AvgJoe - I always thought those 'passive' seatbelts were the stupidest thing ever invented. Whoever invented them needed their head examined.
Have to be honest - I'm not a fan of SUV's. Most of the vehicles trapped on the LIE during this last storm were SUV's; seems that 4WD wasn't much help but the drivers figured hey, they have 4WD and go through anything while the owners of ordinary front-wheel drive cars wised up and steered clear.
Don't know where you folks are, but we have massive seat belt campaigns around here every year, before every 'traffic-heavy' holiday, with the police out in force manning checkpoints for that and DUI's. $150.00 fine for no seat belt - the first time - is a pretty good deterrent; it just keeps going up after that. 3rd time's the charm, kiss your license goodbye for 90 days. No, thanks, I'll wear the belt.
Awe seat belts are for sissies.. NOT !
"Cell Phone"
Yup. Texting, what do you bet.
why don't these kids have to sit through those gruesome, too graphic highway patrol videos that i had to sit through during drivers ed in high school? that was back in the seventies, and to see pieces of bodies, mutilated babies, with first on the scene video was enough to scare the crap out of me and they were in b&w. i think kids need to SEE what happens as the result of careless driving.
I guess because kids today would not be impacted by the blood and guts as we were. they would probably point and laugh. Not much respect for life at all anymore, not even thier own. My heart goes out to the families.
...and most kids no longer have drivers' education - they discontinued it years ago in our area.
It would be interesting to know what percentage of US high school students have access to driver training through their school (both public and private.) I know that insurance companies no longer offer a discount for completing drivers' ed, but there is a hefty discount for good grades.
We can't assume why this accident happened.They could have had a tire blow out and lack of experience caused the vehicle to be out of control.this is tragic.My condolences to their families.
You can bet the farm cell phone, texting was involved. It seems every time I drive a vehicle drifts into my lane. I pass and the individual has their head down looking at a damn cell phone. Each provider has a simple download that prevents a cell phone from working while moving faster than a few miles an hour. It ought to be federal law that this download be implemented immediately. If you want to yack or text pull the car over. PERIOD!
Or use "Blue Tooth" if you want to keep driving while yacking along...
Gringo,
I had no idea there was a download available. I'm curious how it works. This may sound like a dumb question and probably is.
How does a cell phone that is in a driver's hand and is basically still, know how fast a car is moving?
I'm not trying to be sarcastic either.
Bob - probably GPS.
The real question is how it knows if you're a driver or passenger. Until they figure that part out, any call to make it "mandatory" isn't going to fly.
Cell phones, drinking & driving, distracted driving, no seat belts........texting.....whatever.....We always hear the possibilities thrown out there for speculation as to the cause. No one ever seems to mention the commercials that auto manufacturers like to bombard us with...the sexy ads of the latest model car speeding along recklessly.....along mountainous roads with hairpin turns.....( Cadillac is a current example...) Sure, these companies are trying to show off their performance & speed, but at the same time....they have to take SOME of the responsibility for encouraging people who are too stupid to know any better......to try and drive like that.
Dennis Moore,You are assuming, due to the age of the driver and passengers,that it was inattentiveness.It could have been a tire that blew out.He could have had a medical problem that was not yet diagnosed such as epilepsy or a heart condition.
Once again I have to sit and read where young kids have died as the result of a roll over accident involving a SUV type of vehicle . Do people not realize that young drivers have not had the chance to really get in tune with the physics involved with driving vehicles ? . Put them in a common car and let them learn how to control and anticipate G-Force shift before turning young in experianced drivers loose in them otherwise ..This sadly will not be the last of these kinds of stories .
I agree. I look back on my first car in 1978. It was a 65 4 DR Impala with a 283 V8 and 2 speed Powerglide automatic. Big, long, wide, heavy and slow. Perfect vehicle for a beginning driver. It didn't handle well and the front drum brakes weren't great either. But what that did was lower the threshold of getting into trouble. Reaching the limits of the car happened at a slower speed, a speed that was good for a beginning driver. The capabilities of the car matched the capabilities of the driver.
Today at the age of 50 I can say that I bought new a 1989 Jeep Cherokee and then a 2001 Jeep Cherokee. I have safely used these as my daily driver for 23 years. Short, narrow, 4x4 with no ABS, no traction control, no stability control, no cameras or sensors and caused no accidents, had no rollovers, no flips, etc. Only accident was getting rear ended at a light.
But any car today has acceleration and handling which is greater than the capability of a beginning driver. Add the huge increase in the amount of traffic and the learning curve is a lot tougher today. All billboards use to be static, now they change messages, flash, etc which adds distraction. How many of us, myself included have looked at the electronic billboards just a little too long to try to see the next ad? If experienced drivers are distracted by them how can beginning drivers not be?
And now everything has a screen on it, even cars. You have to scroll through menus to make adjustments that used to be done with real knobs and switches. Things that you could do by feel. Now you have to look at the screen (take your eyes off the road) in order to do it. Throw your friends in the car with their electronic gadgets and they are probably sticking them in the drivers face saying "look at this, listen to this".
Too many gadgets, too much distraction, vehicles which reach their limits far above the limits of the driver.
economykiller,
Lots of good sense in your post. Car manufacturers are getting a little better now. They're designing alot of features that are voice commanded. Hopefully someday features like those will replace the on dash screens and rear view cameras that people rely on all too often.
I feel for the teens' families and it's not my place to draw conclusions as to how this accident happened. It could have happened when the driver tried to avoid an animal or something. Who knows? MSNBC has once again left out alot of important facts. Peace to everyone this accident has affected.
Sadly they were probably involved in some stupid kid stuff, fooling around on the road, speeding more than likely. Teenagers are wont to do dumb things, sometimes to their peril. RIP
The young and restless.........just having fun.....sad.
cars don't kill people, people kill people
DUH
Steveo,
Why are being a condesending $ h!tbird?
Wow! This is NATIONAL news??? 'Cause a mother and her two daughters died here just the other day in a single car accident. A few days before that another car ran off the raod and the guy died. Seems like a couple days before that another couple of people died in a car accident too. And... now I'm no soothsayer and I hope no one comes and burns me at the stake for being a witch, but I'll just betcha before this week is out, someone else dies in car accident :o
GDAWG That's why every story has a "Headline" Read It if it doesn't interest you Move On and your attempt at being Funny Well it was Futile.
y don't u get in a car & drive off a cliff.
CA crash had a 4 pair to ur 2.
Rules I taught to my Son......
1) Anything is better than a head-on
2) Swerving to avoid a squirrel will kill you
3) 10 seconds could be the difference in the rest of your life
Speed kills!
i have driven race cars all my life and do not feel right unless i'm "belted in".......rip
Highway 58 is a very dangerous road. Maps make it look like a shortcut. Its small and winding with jagged turns out of nowhere resulted from most likely property disputes during construction. Chances are these kids were killed by a dangerous road.
California (esp LA) has some of the windiest, narrowest highways I've driven on. It is a little unnerving to be on a multi-lane freeway that suddenly starts snaking left and right when you're rolling at hwy speeds - with cars on both sides of you doing the same.
Not where these kids had their wreck,at the cal city interchange it is straight and wide open.
My bet is excessive speed with a high profile vehicle.
This one accident killed as many people as ex-officer Dorner. Consider the effort expended to stop him from killing more, and the effort that will be expended to stop further accidents like this (basically none.) We treat the road accidents as a fact of life. The factors that contribute (or make an accident more likely and more deadly) are well known in many cases, but very little is done to reduce or eliminate them.
The car crashes might actually be easier to predict and prevent.
We are horrified of the psychotic killer, but nonchalant about the much larger loss due to road wrecks.
ban cars-- if this were a shooting it would get top headlines this wont even be a footnote in the news. we do know the real agenda for our newest dictator.
A shooting is intentional, and guns make killing waayy too easy, and they kill at a distance.
Cars have a legitimate purpose and don't kill, unless something went very wrong. It's much harder to kill someone with your car.-
I suppose you own guns. Hope you won't become another headline: "estranged husband kills ex-wife and children"
If you marry a man named Sue you deserve what you get...
Always, Always , ALWAYS BUCKLE YOUR SEAT BELT, what a tragic waste
Same BS, just the faces change. It ain't so bad getting old.
This stupid 20 year old clearly has mental issues to go out all alone, in another country yet, get plastered to the point where she could hardly walk and then get herself raped! Can't blame the city folks!
NBC - why is this news? Other states have fatal car crashes involving young people everyday and yes, some with more than four in one crash. Does it make the news because it's in beloved California - your favorite state? Does it make the news because its a slow news day and you have a quota to fill? Does it make the news because you knew one of the victims or their family member? Unfortunately this type of tragedy happens all too often for you to make it headline throughout the entire country. NBC you are so screwed up - news organization - Ha!!!!!!!