Student Blake Myers lies dead on the hood of one of the two cars involved in the crash.

Student Blake Myers lies dead on the hood of one of the two cars involved in the crash.

The Warren County SADD and Warren County Sheriff’s Office Mock Crash is intended to give students an idea of what it would be like to be in a serious crash.

There was screaming – “I can’t feel my legs” “We gotta get out of here” “What is taking so long?” – lots of blood, and heavy equipment tearing the doors and roofs off of cars.

Blake Myers of Youngsville High School was pronounced dead at the scene.

His mother arrived more than half an hour later. She had not been reached by law enforcement or some other official agency. She read on social media that her son was lying dead on the hood of a car in front of the high school. When she arrived, she was screaming and trying to push her way to her son.

Warren County Coroner Melissa Zydonik announced the preliminary cause of death as blunt force trauma due to a motor vehicle crash, pending toxicology results.

Another student, Ethan Senz, was flown by Stat MedEvac helicopter for treatment of serious injuries after waiting for almost 40 minutes in an ambulance.

As he was removed from the ambulance by the flight crew, he asked about his friend. “Is Blake ok?”

Then, he simply said, “I want to go home.”

His injuries would likely result in him spending a lifetime in a wheelchair, according to officials at the scene.

Myers and Senz took the most serious injuries. Melea Jenkins, Jack Darling, Madalynn Perry, Shea Walton, Elizabeth Kays, and Iris Kiehl were all hurt, but are expected to recover.

The call for the crash went out at 12:58 p.m.

Youngsville Volunteer Fire Department Chief Vern Edmiston was the first on the scene, at about 1:01 p.m. He said he found a two-vehicle crash with four patients in one vehicle and four in the other.

When crews arrived about two minutes later, they began the process of extricating the victims from the vehicles.

“We’re peeling the roof off,” Edmiston said. “We have to get the patients secured. There are two critical ones in there.”

Myers’ lifeless body was largely ignored – he had been partially ejected from the vehicle. His head and torso were lying on the hood of the sedan, his legs were inside the cabin.

In all, firefighters from Youngsville, Garland, Starbrick, and Wrightsville volunteer fire departments, EmergyCare, and Stat MedEvac assisted at the scene.

The helicopter was called at about 1:10 p.m.

A witness at the scene, Emily Hutchings-Muth, said she saw the crash. “I saw two cars coming fast toward each other,” she said. “They just crashed into each other. A guy flew out the window.”

“There was all this screaming,” Hutchings-Muth said. “I can’t believe this happened. They were my classmates.”

Police placed a bottle of alcohol from one vehicle and a suspected THC vape pen from the other into evidence.

They took an intoxicated juvenile, Jenkins, who was driving one of the vehicles, away in handcuffs.

“We’re definitely looking at the driver of the white vehicle,” Warren County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Rachel Canfield said. “Obvious DUI. Unfortunately, her friend is deceased, so she’ll catch charges for that as well.”

Youngsville Borough Police Officer Ben Leach escorted Jenkins from the scene.

The other driver, Perry, faced charges as well – driving too fast and drag racing, Leach said. And, she could face additional charges if she is found to have been under the influence of THC.

In the vehicle driven by Perry – the one with the suspected THC vape pen, Darling repeatedly insisted, “We’re sober. It was Melea. It was all her.”

After 24 minutes, he was removed from the vehicle and taken to an ambulance. “I’m not going to jail,” he said. “My parents can’t find out.”

In the audience, Hutchings-Muth was one of 17 students at Youngsville High School who were designated as casualties of intoxicated driving crashes during school Thursday. Once their times came, those casualties were no longer allowed to speak in school – they were ghosts. According to Warren County Sheriff Brian Zeybel, the number represents the nationwide number of people killed every day in crashes involving alcohol or chemical intoxication.

“That’s a real body count,” Zeybel said. “That many people, by this time of day, are not on this earth because of an alcohol- or chemical-related crash.”

“Make the right decisions,” he said.

“We can prevent this,” Zeybel said. “You can still go have fun. That decision – to drink and drive – is the most important part of this whole thing. We’re coming to your house (to notify your family). Your mom’s phone is dinging – ‘Your son’s laying on a car hood.'”

“If it’s an ‘A’ instead of a ‘B’ we’re not cutting you out of a car,” he said.

He asked for a show of hands for those who would trade places with Jenkins or Perry. “We have a driver who is drunk. We have a driver who is high,” he said. “Nobody wants to go to prison. The guilt… that’s worse than prison.”

“That cat in the helicopter – that guy might trade places with this guy,” Zeybel said pointing to Myers’ place on the hood.

The organizers of the event and the many responders who participated worked to make the crash as realistic as possible.

“There are textbooks everywhere,” Hutchings-Muth said. “There are cans of alcohol.”

“It’s terrible,” she said. “Terrifying.”

Jacob Blankenberg was another of the ghosts. He was surprised by “how realistic it is,” he said. “I saw it on PulsePoint. I didn’t expect that.”

“It gave me chills,” he said.

Myers gave an interview after the event, caked with fake blood. “I learned that it takes forever to get out and get help when they need it,” he said. He didn’t have any real injuries, but 30 minutes of lying motionless on a car hood waiting for help still “felt like forever.”

He remembers hearing his mother’s anguished screams. “That scared me,” he said. “It freaked me out.”

It had an impact on the students – juniors and seniors from Youngsville and seniors from Eisenhower who had never been through a mock crash – in the audience. “When Blake’s mom came out, half of them were sobbing in the bleachers,” Canfield said.

“It was really scary at the beginning,” Perry said. “We started screaming. Screaming for 10 minutes felt more like an hour. It felt like forever.”

Her takeaway is exactly what SADD and the Sheriff’s Office hope. “Never drink and drive and definitely be careful on the road,” she said.

The events are held late in the year so they are fresh in the minds of students who are going to proms or celebrating graduation.

The program has been running for about 30 years in the county and “since we’ve been doing it, there haven’t been any prom-night fatalities,” Canfield said.

COVID interrupted the mock crash program and there had not been one in the county since 2019, she said.

A mock crash scheduled for Friday, April 28, at Warren Area High School, was canceled due to weather. Some of the actors who had prepared for that event joined the Youngsville crash.

Youngsville Borough Police Chief Todd Mineweaser extended his thanks to all of those who participated in the event. “It takes a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff,” he said.

Many volunteers took a day off of work to join, he said. Stat MedEvac absorbed expenses in order to help make the event more impactful.

Canfield extended a special thanks to the student participants. “They did a great job,” she said. “It was fantastic.”