A 19-year-old Spring Hill man was arrested on a charge of reckless driving Wednesday after troopers say he hit a car and caused it to overturn off the Howard Frankland Bridge into the construction zone below.
Around 5:20 p.m., the man was driving a Ford Focus east in the inside lane of Interstate 275 on the bridge, “traveling recklessly, at a high rate of speed, changing lanes in between cars and making other drivers take evasive maneuvers to avoid a collision,” the Florida Highway Patrol said in a news release.
Near milepost 34, the man overtook a Lexus RX350 in the outside lane, driven by a 74-year-old Sarasota woman. The man then moved into the outside shoulder to try to pass the woman in the Lexus. Due to the construction zone, the man had no space to pass and was forced back into the travel lane, colliding with the Lexus, troopers say.
After the impact, the Lexus rotated, collided with a guardrail, overturned off the bridge and struck a Nissan Frontier that was parked and unoccupied in the construction zone below. The Ford was “redirected off the roadway” and hit a parked, unoccupied Toyota Camry in the construction zone, the news release states.
Both drivers were taken to the hospital with injuries that were not considered life-threatening, according to the Highway Patrol. The man was arrested on a charge of reckless driving.
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