VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — Moments before the sun rose over a cloudy horizon in Virginia Beach Saturday morning, a car broke through multiple gates and drove onto the Fishing Pier before plunging off the end into the ocean.
Video shared with News 3 shows the car drive toward the end of the pier, which sits between 14th and 15th streets, briefly pause, and then go off the end. A flock of birds can be seen fluttering away moments before.
“My first reaction was I was feeling very surprised and then very sad," said Manon Scholl.
Scholl works at Ocean Eddie’s on the pier.
She said she was woken up Saturday morning by a phone call from a friend telling her what happened.
“I was really confused. I was, like, what do you mean somebody drove off the pier? That’s obviously very hard," said Scholl.
It is difficult to see how this could have been an accident because the driver had to break through not one but two barriers to get onto the pier. The cellphone video shows the driver braking several times while on the pier before driving off and into the water.
"I have a lot of family members who have suffered through mental illness in the past and seeing this just made me think about all the times I could’ve protected someone," Scholl said.
Late Saturday afternoon, police tape was still up on the pier and the area where the car broke through and drove down the pier was still boarded up.
A police boat was also patrolling the water around the pier as police figured out the best way to get the car out of the water.
One fisherman told News 3 the water at the end of the pier is about 15 feet deep.
“Right now, what we're doing is trying to assess the situation, trying to see what resources we need to recover the vehicle, and trying to see how many occupants were in the vehicle and then detectives are going to go from there," Virginia Beach Police Public Information Officer Jude Brenya explained Saturday morning.
Charlotte Murphy, who works at Ocean Eddie's, came in to work shortly after the incident.
"Never heard of anything like this in all my seven years," she said. "Definitely the craziest thing that I've heard, for sure."
Virginia Beach police and firefighters quickly responded and, using sonar equipment, the police Marine Division worked to locate the vehicle.
"From the scans that we have, we do believe the vehicle is located at the bottom of the ocean," said Brenya. "It takes a while to get the divers prepped and then they have to have a plan in place (before divers can enter the water)."
Who was in the car and why they ended up on the pier were among the questions still unanswered Saturday afternoon.
The news of what happened has traveled fast.
"We grew up here. I’m 53 years old and I’ve never heard of it," one man said as he and another man stood on the pier near the police tape. "I had to come see."
“I just want to say pray for everybody in the family that’s related to anybody that’s in the car. Let’s just pray for everybody, friends and family," said Scholl.
News 3 will continue to follow this story and keep you updated on air and online.
