PLANTATION, FLA. (WSVN) - A customer meant to tap the brakes but instead hit the gas ending in a dangerous drive.
Haitian restaurant La Belle Monique is in need of a makeover after a Range Rover smashed through its walls.
The incident took place Thursday evening, at 937 South State Road 7 in Plantation.
The owner said he and some friends were inside eating at a table, and when they walked back into the kitchen, the accident occurred.
“I was like a few inches, I was right at the table about one second. I left the table, went to grab the food to take to my friend, then this happened,” said restaurant owner Pierre Sterlin.
Surveillance videos show different angles of a Range Rover crashing through the concrete walls of the establishment, knocking over tables where the owner and friends had been sitting.
Sterlin said he knows the woman who was behind the wheel, that she is actually a regular customer and had just stopped by to pick up some food.
After the crash, one of Sterlin’s friends pulled her out of the vehicle.
They said she was stunned but otherwise OK.
“I heard it, I panicked and asked everyone to please to get out of the building,” said Stanley Tilerin.
Tilerin works next door, and after the woman was taken out of the vehicle, his concern was the still running car.
“I had seen smoke and fire. I grabbed the fire extinguisher and I extinguished it, that’s it,” said Tilerin.
Video shows Tilerin’s business destroyed by the damaged fire wall that separates the businesses.
Plantation Firefighters surveyed the destruction, but despite all of the commotion everyone was OK.
“It was an accident,” said Sterlin “When it has to happen, it has to happen, no one can stop it.”
The owner and friends said that they’re just happy that everyone is OK.
Copyright 2024 Sunbeam Television Corp. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.