Brooklyn man killed, woman injured as car falls 40 feet into LIRR train yard, NYPD says
A 70-year-old motorist’s medical episode set off a Brooklyn crash that plunged his car 40 feet into a below-grade Long Island Rail Road yard, killing him and injuring a 60-year-old woman who was his passenger, police said Saturday.
Francois Cadely of Canarsie was killed in the wild 12:41 p.m. Friday crash on Vanderbilt Ave. near Pacific St. in Prospect Heights, just two blocks from the Barclays Center.
The crash happened after Cadely pulled his Audi Q5 out of a McDonald’s parking lot nearby on Atlantic Ave. and tried to turn right.
That’s when he was stricken by an unexpected and still unknown medical problem and lost control of the wheel, said police. The Audi continued turning and ended up heading west across Vanderbilt Ave. and accelerating, cops said.
The speeding car blew through a concrete Jersey barrier and fence lining the eastern perimeter of the rail yard and plummeted 40 feet to the ground below, taking the concrete barrier with it, police said.
The Audi hit the ground on its driver’s side, cops said.
First responders pulled Cadely and then his female passenger out of the mangled car and rushed them to New York-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital. Cadely died at the hospital, said cops.
The woman remained in critical condition Saturday with extensive chest and back injuries, cops said.
Cadely lived about six miles from where he crashed, police said. It was not immediately clear how Cadely knew his passenger. The two have different last names and lived at different addresses, a police source said.
