8 killed as church van crashes into canal

A church van ran through a stop sign, crossed all four lanes of a rural highway and crashed into a canal, killing eight people and injuring ten in Florida early today, authorities said.
The van with "Independent Haitian Church of Reformation" written on its side was heading back to church in Fort Pierce, north of West Palm Beach on the Atlantic coast, after a weekend convention in Fort Myers, according to the Florida Highway Patrol.
"They didn't see that stop sign. They shot right through it," Glades County Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy Duane Pottorff said.
Eighteen people were in the 15-seat van when the van crashed about 12:30 a.M. Today, said Lt. Gregory S. Bueno of the Highway Patrol.

An emergency dispatch call came in at 12:31 a.M., and deputies arrived four minutes later, officials said. The van had gone down an eight-to-10 foot (two-to-three meter) embankment and landed in shallow water of the canal, which is lined with tall grass and weeds.
The driver and seven passengers died. The 10 other passengers were taken to four hospitals.

Among them was a 4-year-old child in stable condition. At least two patients were classified as trauma alerts, and at least one passenger had been released. Other passengers' conditions ranged from serious to stable.
Bueno said it wasn't foggy at the time of the crash. There is no lighting on the stretch of road, and the T-intersection is surrounded by farmland.

Today morning, the van had been loaded onto the back of a flatbed truck. The front of the van was smashed in, and the door had been removed.