PEA RIDGE — Checking out at the Dollar General Wednesday afternoon, Mia King was hurrying to finish her transaction to get home to greet her children when they arrived home from school.
King, news clerk for The Times, was halfway through the transaction when a car came through the front door of the store. Glass flew and sticky liquid from soft drink bottles spewed - other customers in line were issued safely out the back door as a customer and an employee dialed 911.
“I was the very last one to make a transaction before they told everybody to put their stuff back ... it was mid-transaction,” King said. “I heard this loud crash and then soda and glass was flying everywhere. I think if those water displays hadn’t been outside the store, she would have come way inside the store because she just hit that gas and didn’t stop.”
“After I figured out what was going on, I felt lucky I was alive,” King said. “I was really scared. I was ready to get out of there.”
The floor, counters and check-out stands were littered with shattered glass and spewed two-liter softdrink bottles. The front doors and a plate-glass window were broken when a 2006 Cadillac driven by Karen Ross, 69, of Pea Ridge, ran into the front doors of the store on Slack Street.
Pea Ridge police said Ross said her foot slipped off the brake and her car jumped the concrete parking block. Ross was not injured. Pea Ridge fire and ambulance personnel responded to the scene.
There were several customers and employees in the store at the time of the accident; no one was injured.
After maintenance cleaned up the store front and placed wood over the door and window openings, the store reopened for business.
News, Pages 1 on 04/13/2011