Minivan crashes through Post Office
By JARED PUTNAM

Above: Blairsville Police Department Officers Tommy Shook and Russell Walker gather information inside the Blairsville Post Office.

Tragedy was narrowly avoided Monday, when a Chrysler minivan crashed through the wall of the Blairsville Post Office and fully entered into the customer service area of the building at approximately 10:45 a.m.

After smashing through the wall the vehicle pushed the counters and tables used by customers into the postal worker stations, which were in turn pushed back against the wall, which also received damage. The damage was limited to this portion of the building.

Both customers and postal workers sustained varying degrees of injuries, including an elderly male customer who

reportedly suffered a fractured pelvis after being pinned between the car and a counter. The vehicle itself had only one occupant, the driver, Joyce Wyckoff, 74, of Blairsville.

Harlan Underwood, a longtime worker at the Blairsville Post Office, received injuries to his hands while attempting to move out of the way of the crash.

“It was just like a big explosion and then the glass [was flying] and I saw the wall lift up and the vehicle coming straight toward me,” Underwood said. “I had nowhere to go. I was trying to escape but it was faster than I was. It was so fast it had the counter already pushed over against the wall.”

Left: The mini-van crashed through counters before being stopped by the wall.

Luckily Underwood was wedged into a small pocket of open space, which he said was basically the only area of the wall where debris had not been pushed against it. “My guardian angel was working overtime,” Underwood joked. He explained that while one of his hands had been bruised by debris, fingers on his other hand were more sore. He guessed that he jammed or sprained them while trying to duck out of the way.

Postmaster Ken Nichols said that the situation could have been far worse had the accident happened just five minutes earlier. “It had been full all morning,” Nichols said, referring to the fact that there had been a line of customers all the way to the door, lined along the wall where the vehicle entered. “It had just opened up. Had it not, it would have been bad.”

The vehicle entered the building at an odd angle, almost completely opposite of the direction in which the lines for the parking spaces are slanted.

It is believed that while attempting to park, the driver instead hit the accelerator, causing the vehicle to hit the curb, which then turned the wheels to the right before it ran over the bushes and through the wall.

The area of the wall that the vehicle hit contained a pair of windows which were both shattered. The portion of the wall between the windows separated from the foundation and was pushed up toward the ceiling as if it was on a hinge. The ceiling also suffered damage. Once the vehicle passed through, the wall returned to an upright position.

Officer Tommy Shook of the Blairsville Police Department said that the vehicle will be checked for mechanical malfunction. He explained that in accordance with Georgia law, the driver was taken to Union General Hospital for the required blood testing. While the incident is still under investigation, Shook said that it does not appear that any charges will be filed in the case.

Leslie Daniel, whose father Wayne Colwell built the building in 1985, and whose mother Barbara Colwell still owns the building today, said that the building is actually leased to the United States Postal Service (USPS).

Daniel explained that USPS checked the building before customers were allowed back inside. “They sent out an engineer to make sure that everything was structurally sound before anybody could go back in,” Daniel stated.

Asked whether or not there were any plans to install some type of concrete barriers used by some businesses, Daniel said that is a decision that would have to be made by the postal service.

As for the current damages, Daniel said that repairs are expected to be finished within a matter of days, provided that the availability of the appropriate materials do not cause a delay.