Mother and child struck on Route 52
A vehicle struck a mother and her four children as they attempted to cross Route 52 in Fishkill on Sunday (March 25), killing the woman and her 10-month-old son.
The New York State Police reported that Zuleyma Lopez, 28, and Abel Torres-Lopez were declared dead at the scene. The three other children — Shayla, 11, Ricardo, 6, and Allan, 4 — were transported to Westchester Medical Center.
The group was struck at about 8:40 p.m. near Old Glenham Road, police said, by a 2003 GMC Yukon traveling westbound in the center/turn lane of the three-lane road. Police said the driver, Robert Mahone, 53, of Fishkill, who remained at the scene, was not speeding or impaired by drugs or alcohol and was not issued any citations.
A family member has set up an GoFundMe page to assist the surviving children.
That’s a very bad area to be crossing the street, and it’s only gonna get worse when those new hotels open up. With the two gas stations and Old Glenham Road right there it’s very bad. The only good I have seen there recently is new sidewalks as a result of the hotel construction.
I used to live in that area, and it was not too safe then, so I can’t imagine it being any better. It is a dangerous intersection. I hope they find a solution to make it safer.
I lived there in the late 1970s and traffic has always been dangerous there. My aunt came to visit me in her Mercedes Benz, not a small car, and she was sideswiped just trying to make a left turn onto Old Glenham Road. Sadly, it might take fatalities of this sort, which was preventable, to actually have the town install a traffic light there.
I was really saddened to hear of this fatality. I’d still love to see a light there. Look at all the traffic coming into one street. You have traffic turning off 84 traveling west, you have cars turning out of the diner onto that road, you have cars turning out of each of those two gas stations into the road, you have cars traveling east on that road coming from Beacon, you have cars coming from Glenham coming onto that road. There’s a lot of incoming traffic entering a very congested area.
It’s natural to want to place blame on someone, or something. There were probably many factors, that I’m sure we’re not all aware of, that played into this tragedy.
Some of the many factors contributing to this tragic accident, from what I have been able to glean, are the darkness at the time, the three potential lanes of traffic going different directions (including a middle lane used for turns), the high and increasing level of traffic on this state highway due in part to the increasing level of commerce and the construction nearby, the single adult trying to supervise several children, and the lack of a traffic control or crosswalk anywhere in the area. Finally the vehicle involved being a large SUV (similar to a large pickup truck) which is higher than a sedan, due to the increased height the visibility of pedestrians is more difficult and any collision with them more serious — it’s more likely for pedestrians, especially smaller ones, to go under the vehicle than to bounce over the top of the hood.
A traffic control with a crosswalk signal on a demand button would possibly have prevented this accident. However, these sorts of accidents can happen just about anywhere, under various, differing circumstances. One must not assume that the driver of a vehicle, any vehicle, can see a pedestrian, especially at night. There are many potential disruptions to visibility. Typically it is easier for a pedestrian to see a vehicle at night than the other way around, for a driver to see a pedestrian.