A girl was struck by a blue Toyota RAV4 and pinned beneath its front axle in the 600 block of North Ripley Street near Holmes Run Parkway in Alexandria on Tuesday evening, and firefighters freed her in under six minutes by improvising with nothing more than ground ladders. She was conscious when crews arrived, and she's expected to make a full recovery.
Multiple people called in the crash around 7:10 p.m., according to ALXnow, which reported that Engine 208 and Tower 208 were the first units on scene. Heavy extraction equipment hadn't yet arrived, so firefighters developed an alternate plan on the spot, using ground ladders as a lever to lift the SUV's weight off the girl before pulling her to safety, per the same outlet's account. She was then transported to Children's National Hospital in Washington, D.C.
The girl rescued from beneath SUV was found conscious and pinned under the vehicle's front axle when crews arrived, and rescue teams had also called in specialized equipment to extract her. The Alexandria Fire Department responded after a report of a pedestrian struck by a vehicle in the same block, according to the city's own Alexandria Fire Department news release.
A Stretch of Road With a Troubled Past
North Ripley Street has seen serious pedestrian incidents before. On November 27, 2023, an adult woman suffered critical injuries after being struck by a vehicle in the 100 block of the same street, according to a notice from the Alexandria Police Department. A city traffic board docket from February 2024 also listed a new crossing at Holmes Run Parkway and North Ripley Street among its agenda items.
The crash fits into a broader pattern across the city. Pedestrian and bicycle crashes in Alexandria fell every year between 2019 and 2022, bottoming out at 41 that year, but then rose to 46 in 2023 and 63 in 2024 before declining to 60 in 2025, according to reporting from Patch. Alexandria Police Lieutenant Nick Lion told the outlet that the city's most serious pedestrian-related crashes tend to happen when drivers make left-hand turns and fail to look into the intersection.
What Investigators Have and Haven't Said
Lion also said police had reviewed accident statements over a five-year span and found that alcohol, speed, and distracted driving were not factors in those crashes, and that a two-week spate of higher-than-normal pedestrian crashes earlier this year had since returned to normal levels. It isn't clear from available reporting whether those same contributing factors applied to Tuesday's crash on North Ripley Street.
No further details about the circumstances of the October 6 collision, including the vehicle's speed or any findings about fault, have been released. For now, officials have confirmed only the outcome that matters most to the family: the girl is expected to recover fully after a rescue that leaned on quick thinking and ground ladders rather than the specialized tools firefighters had originally called in.
