Kiara Denisse Nichols, Daniel Gambrell, 4 Injured in Car Accident in Garland, TX
Garland, TX -- September 4, 2022, Kiara Nichols, Daniel Gambrell, and four others were injured due to a two-vehicle accident.
Public information says that the crash happened at the intersection of Highway 66 and Centerville Road at around 9:30 p.m.
Officials said that 33-year-old Daniel Gambrell was in a Cadillac Escalade traveling westbound on the highway. 22-year-old Kiara Nichols was said to be in a Volkswagen Golf on northbound Centerville. At the crossing, the Cadillac crashed into the right side of the Volkswagen. The traffic signal may have been inoperable at the time when the incident happened, but this has not been confirmed.
Due to the collision, Nichols had reportedly incapacitating injuries. Gambrell, three passengers in his vehicle, and a child in Nichols's vehicle were all said to have non-incapacitating injuries. Right now, there is no additional information publicly available.
It's not often police list an "inoperable" traffic signal as a factor in a serious crash, but it's one of those factors I always tell people can crop up unexpectedly, which is why it's worth considering. But when they say inoperable, do they mean a blinking red light, or do they mean outright off? With a blinking red light, there isn't really much of an excuse for a driver not to stop appropriately.
But if there were no lights while it was dark out, what caused that? How long was it like that? Did anyone warn authorities so they could send someone to direct traffic? My gut tells me these details from authorities are far from telling the whole story, and I wonder if any locals were in the area when this crash happened and can shed some light on what may have gone wrong.
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