Seven motorcyclists were killed on a rural highway in New Hampshire Friday night after a pickup truck towing a flatbed trailer plowed into the group, Bloomberg reported.
Among those who perished in the fiery crash were several marine veterans who had been riding as part of the group to attend a charity event.
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Several of the motorcyclists involved in the collision were members of the Jarhead Motorcycle Club.
According to its website , the group consists of “honorably discharged United States Marines and FMF Corpsmen.” The website also says its group is “dedicated to supporting veteran’s causes.”
“All our people are just good, hard-changing Marines,” Scotty Swann, a member of the club, told WMUR .
On the night of the crash, the group of 10 people had just left their hotel and were en-route to a charity event at the American Legion.
As they travelled along a two-lane highway in the North Woods community of Randolph, they were stuck by the pickup truck, which subsequently caught fire.
Beatrice Engstrand, a witness of the crash who had been staying at a nearby inn, told WMUR the flames were “about 20 feet high” and the air was clouded with “intense smoke.”
She and Jerry Hamanne, the co-owner of the inn, rushed to the scene and helped as many of the injured motorcyclists as they could.
Enstrand, a neurologist, said she applied a tourniquet to one of the injured and performed compressions on others until medical help arrived.
“It was just terrible. No one thought of taking photos or anything like that. You just want to help the people who were screaming and laying there in the road.”
Of the three surviving motorcyclists injured in the crash, two have been treated and released from the local hospital.
The third was transported by air and remains in hospital.
The names of the victims of the crash will not be released until their families are notified, New Hampshire Deputy Attorney General Jane Young told CNN . Their bodies have been taken to the medical examiner’s office in Concord.
One of the three survivors has now spoken out about the events of the devastating crash.
Dawn Brindley’s bike fell to the ground during the collision and she rolled to get out of harm’s way.
“It was just all fire,” she told WMUR. “I just looked around. Somebody helped me up. I was just hysterical.”
State police collision analysis and reconstruction teams are currently investigating the crash.
Authorities are asking the public for help in the form of videos, photos, or any other information regarding the accident or the vehicles involved.
“This is one of the worst tragic incidents that we have investigated here in the state,” New Hampshire State Police Col. Chris Wagner said. “It’s going to be a very lengthy investigation.”
A campaign has been established in an effort to help the families of those who died in the collision.
A GoFundMe has been set up for the victims of the crash and their families.
The description on the page states: “Our pack was struck by an oncoming vehicle and we lost 5 patch holders and 2 supporters, and many others are injured. Our club and the families are going to need help and we cannot do it alone.”
Since it was posted on Saturday, the campaign has raised nearly $200,000 of its $700,000 goal.
The driver of the pickup truck has been identified as 23-year-old Volodoymyr Zhukovskyy.
Zhukovskyy survived the crash and was not hospitalized, nor immediately charged with any offense.
