Major Miami street shut for hours by van-into-building crash after police pursuit
A four-block section of Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood was closed Thursday afternoon after a possible stolen van crashed into an Uber sedan and a building following a police chase, Miami-Dade police said.
Miami-Dade Detective Alvaro Zabaleta said police shut down Northwest 27th Avenue, a six-lane street, from Flagler Street to Northwest Fourth Street. The site of the crash is the YHCE Engineering office building at 99 NW 27th Ave.
Miami-Dade Fire Rescue Lt. Pete Sanchez said the woman driving the van was taken to a hospital in critical condition and the woman taking the Uber was in serious condition, both with multiple fractures. The male driving the Uber was in stable condition.
Zabaleta said Miami-Dade police’s crime prevention unit was patrolling in the area of Flagler and Northwest 40th and 42nd avenues around 10:30 a.m. when a parked white van caught their eye. A license plate check, Zabaleta said, turned up the van as a stolen vehicle.
Once the van started rolling north on one of the avenues, police say they followed until the van got near Northwest Seventh Street. An attempted traffic stop turned into an eastbound pursuit on Northwest Seventh Street. Zabaleta said as Miami-Dade’s cruisers dropped off pursuit on the busy east-west street, the driver of the van swung south onto Northwest 27th Avenue and continued at high speed, as tracked by Miami-Dade police helicopters.
The pursuit ended when the van driver cut into the northbound lanes, careened off a white sedan and into the YHCE Engineering office building. After inspectors determined the building suffered no structural damage, Sanchez said, workers returned to the building.
Zabaleta said Miami police told their Miami-Dade counterparts that the van matched the description of a van involved in several burglaries in Miami under investigation.
