Crash During Parade Injures Onlookers

Five people are in the hospital after they were hit while watching a parade downtown. The southeast shriners convention is here in the Scenic City and Saturday they held a parade down Market Street. The shriners raise money to run twenty-two children's hospitals across the country for kids needing free orthopedic or burn care. They wanted to bring awareness and excitement for their work to Chattanooga. But when one small car in the parade hit another, sending it into the crowd, the eight onlookers turned into victims. Honks and drums sounded off the beginning of the Shriners parade down Market Street. Shriner Perry Perkins says, "What we're doing here today is entertaining the kids, the parents, the grandparents, and that's what we're doing today to show that shriners not only operate the hospitals for our children, but we also have a good time."

A good time that was ruined by these two cars, a red doonbuggy hit the small yellow car propelling it into the crowd. Callie Webb saw the whole thing. "It was like a bang, a lot of screaming, every body was scared including Callie."

And including Thomas Petty's family who were standing just feet away from the crash. Petty caught the whole scene on videotape, and once he knew his family was okay, helped the victims caught underneath the yellow car. He says, "Here comes the doonbuggy hits the yellow car and goes on top of those people and all I could do was pick the car up."

While a cracked windshield and flat tire are the only signs left on the vehicles, the ambulance pulls away showing much more serious affects of the collision. The accident leaves five people here at Erlanger recovering, including two children, ages three and seven. It also leaves many unanswered questions abuot how this disaster could happen at a charity parade.

Chattanooga Police Offcier Jerri Weary says, "The information we have is that they were driving in circles, for a parade on that street with that size, it wasn't wise for the vehicles to be driving in the condition that they were."

But Petty says it wasn't the driver's fault, but seemed to be a malfunction with the steering device. He says, "He was coming straight on and had some speed, looked like he was trying to jerk the wheel when he hit the yellow car."

Causing this event for charity and enjoyment to to end in mulitple injuries. Petty's son "It was probably the best parade I've ever been to except the wreck."

Chattanooga Police tell us they must treat this accident like any normal traffic wreck, and charges could be filed against the driver depending on the injuries of the victims and the investigation into the cause of the crash. We tried to reach the Shriners for a comment, but they didn't return our calls. We do know that none of the victims injuries are life threatening.