A tragic accident occurred early Saturday morning when a vehicle veered off the road and into an assisted living facility in Knoxville, Tennessee, resulting in the death of an elderly resident. The Knoxville Police Department reported to the scene at the Shannondale Assisted Living Facility located at 7350 Middlebrook Pike shortly after the incident took place at around 5:15 a.m.
The collision was caused by a KIA minivan that, for reasons still under investigation, accelerated from an adjacent apartment complex on Woodview Lane, crossed all four lanes of Middlebrook Pike, and then smashed into the exterior of the facility. Upon impact, the vehicle penetrated one of the rooms, fatally injuring a 96-year-old male occupant. Responding, Knoxville Police Department officials and the Knoxville Fire Department personnel worked to extract the driver of the minivan and transported them to a local hospital with injuries described as non-life-threatening.
The identity of the deceased has not been released, pending notification of next-of-kin. The investigation into the crash is ongoing, and law enforcement officials are piecing together the events that led to this fatal outcome. What's clear at this time is that community members are shaken by the breach of safety in a space dedicated to the care of the elder members of their community. The driver's motives and the exact cause of the crash remain an unsettling mystery.
