Car crashes through entrance Lanett Dollar Tree

BY JOHN BRICE,
FOR THE LAFAYETTE SUN

LANETT — The calm routine of daily life in Lanett was shattered Monday, Aug. 31, when a vehicle crashed through the front entrance of the Dollar Tree store at 1110 S. Gilmer Ave.

Witnesses described the driver as a middle-aged woman who was not injured in the crash. One customer suffered minor cuts from flying glass.

Shortly after the crash, a cashier only identified as Nikki described what happened.

“I was the only employee in the store who was just right there at the front,” Nikki said.
“We [saw] her take out the pillar. I thought at that moment she would stop. It was like I was watching it in slow motion.”

Nikki said one customer had just entered the store when the crash occurred.

“The man who had just walked through the door, he got cut on the backsides of his legs by the glass when it exploded and on his thumb,” she said. “The lady, even after she hit the doors, she was still on the gas. She was still going, and you could smell burning rubber inside the store.”

Nikki said the driver was not transported to the hospital, and an officer who was nearby was able to respond quickly.

“She didn’t even go to the hospital,” she said. “There was an officer already here. He was two buildings down but he was already on site. They just let her leave. The whole front end of the vehicle was torn off basically. My store manager had to yell at her to stop pressing the gas for the wheels to stop from going.”

Nikki said the driver told paramedics that she had intended to park but pressed the accelerator instead of the brake.

“From the front door of the vehicle forward had entered the store. It completely blocked off both of our front doors. We had to let people out of the back door because there was no way to let them out of the front. We had to evacuate the whole store.”

With the store’s front entrance blocked, employees turned their attention to getting customers safely out of the building.

Nikki praised Lanett police and emergency medical personnel for their response.

“It was like a movie. I felt like I needed to help somebody, but I couldn’t do anything. People were still standing in line wanting to check out. I was like ‘are you all not seeing what I saw?’ I appreciate the Lanett Police Department and the EMS tremendously. They were good sports about it and helped calm us down. I was panicking, I thought I was going to die. I saw my life flash before my eyes. But the EMS and police, they were really great and helpful in aiding us getting the store taped off.”

In the hours after the crash, employees began cleaning up broken glass while waiting for maintenance crews to secure the damaged storefront.

“We were waiting on maintenance to come board it up. We were sweeping up glass on the inside of the store, there was really nothing else we could do. We don’t know when the store will be open again. [It will be as] soon as maintenance comes out and fixes it but the structural damage from the pillar being taken out could be much more. The pillar was hollow inside, so it couldn’t have been doing that much structurally hopefully.”

The extent of the structural damage and a timeline for reopening the store were not immediately known.