By DANIELLE RUSH
SHARPSVILLE — Tri-Central High School senior Sally Adams lost her other half Wednesday.
Today, a funeral will be conducted at the school for her twin sister, Sarah Adams, and Colton Johnson, who were the victims of a mock crash staged to remind students of the consequences of drinking and driving.
Early Wednesday afternoon, the flashing lights of emergency vehicles in the school parking lot could be seen from at least a mile away, and a Lifeline helicopter circled overhead.
At the crash scene, a black Ford Ranger pickup and a copper-colored Buick LeSabre were head-to-head, and Sharpville and Windfall firefighters worked to remove doors from the vehicles. Johnson lay motionless on the pavement, a bloodied leg sticking out from under the white sheet covering him.
The truck’s driver, Grant Gappans, was given a field sobriety test by Tipton County Sheriff deputies, while his passengers, Amy and Amanda Calvin, were removed from the truck.
Kaylee Hewitt was the car’s driver, and Johnson had been her front-seat passenger. Sarah Adams and Cami Thomas were in the back seat of the LeSabre, and from time to time, Thomas would scream as firefighters worked to remove the more seriously-injured passengers from the car. Medics wheeled a girl in bloodied jeans past the watching students into an ambulance, followed by another girl with bloody arms.
Coroner Roy Silvers gloved his hands and lifted the sheet over Johnson, to look for identification, before dropping the sheet back over him, shaking his head.
As another bloodied girl emerged on a stretcher and was taken to the waiting helicopter, the Grim Reaper stalked through the accident scene, scythe in hand.
Finally, the last girl, Thomas, who by then had stopped screaming, was taken from the car. She started screaming again, “Colton, wake up!” as she was wheeled towards the ambulance, which pulled away with sirens blaring.
Once the living victims have been taken care of, firefighters gently zipped Johnson into a white bag.
In the bleachers, Jane West, Allie Davis and Ashlyn Flittner hugged each other and wept as they watch the stretchers wheeled past.
“It’s crazy, it’s unbelievable,” Davis said, adding that the last time the school had this crash, she was a freshman and it did not impact her as hard.
“It was a lot more heart-rending this time because we’re seniors,” and their friends were involved.
“They’re like our best friends, and seeing them get taken away was really hard,” Flittner said. “The people here were like family.”
West said the mock crash shows the students that accidents don’t just happen to other people.
“It can happen to us,” she said.
Students moved inside to the auditorium, where Deputy Jeff Pyke informed them Gappans was arrested on charges of operating a vehicle while intoxicated causing death, a Class C felony. He could face eight years in prison and a $10,000 fine, Pyke said, with a blood alcohol level of .08.
He and Deputy Denny Pearson urged the students to make good choices.
“Don’t make me have to do my job like I had to do today,” Pearson said.
Firefighters then explained what they had to do to remove the students from the vehicles, and updated them on their injuries, which included broken bones, severe bleeding, internal bleeding and head injuries.
Paul Kingery, assistant chief of the Sharpsville Volunteer Fire Department, said those injured are not the only victims.
“We were all victims, because we had to see it,” he said.
Parents and family are also victims.
Pearson escorted Mark and Terri Adams, Sarah’s parents, to the auditorium stage. He asked if they have a daughter named Sarah, then told them she had been in an accident. Mark Adams asked if she was hurt, and Pearson told them she passed away at the hospital.
“We have another daughter, Sally,” Mark Adams said in a panicked voice. Pearson told him Sally was not at the scene, and asked if he could call a chaplain or someone to help them.
Even knowing it was a portrayal, Terri Adams said it was hard to watch the accident scene.
“Every time I heard [Thomas] scream, it was more realistic.”
She said they participated so students will “never drink and drive, and no parents will have to go through this.”
Mark Adams said they had to go from the school to plan Sarah’s funeral, and she will not come home until after the funeral.
He also hopes the accident will be a learning experience, and “after [the funeral] they get an appreciation of what they do have, and they realize what they have to lose.”
Sally Adams agreed with her mother it was hard to watch the accident, and she hopes her classmates learn from it.
“Don’t do something stupid. Don’t drink and drive.”
