Driver hurt when car rams Checkers in Shirley, cops say
Northbound and southbound William Floyd Parkway were closed at Montauk Highway in Shirley for about an hour early Thursday after a vehicle careened into a Checkers fast-food restaurant, rupturing a gas line, Suffolk County fire officials said.
The driver of the car, whose identity was not released, was taken to Brookhaven Memorial Hospital Medical Center in East Patchogue with non-life-threatening injuries, Suffolk County police said.
Police said the driver told responding officers that his brakes had failed before the collision.
Police said there were two employees in the restaurant at the time of the crash. Neither was injured.
The road was closed after a 911 call at 8:28 a.m., police said, but it reopened at 9:30 a.m.
Fire officials said firefighters from Brookhaven and Mastic Beach responded to the scene, as did crews from Shirley Ambulance. Police said that during the parkway closure, traffic was diverted onto Northern Boulevard.
John Valenti, a reporter at Newsday since 1981, has been honored nationally by the Associated Press and Society of the Silurians for investigative, enterprise and breaking news reporting, as well as column writing, and is the author of “Swee'pea,” a book about former New York playground basketball star Lloyd Daniels. Valenti is featured in the Emmy Award-winning ESPN 30-for-30 film “Big Shot.”
