‘She was my everything’: Woman dies after car crashes into home near Spanaway

SPANAWAY, Wash. — A woman is dead and a man is critically hurt after a high-impact crash into a home near Spanaway.

The car hit a home on 225th Street Court East near 46th Avenue East early Thursday. Deputies were called to the scene at about 2:20 a.m.

Pierce County Sheriff’s Sgt. Darren Moss said the car was heading south on 46th Avenue from 224th Street, apparently at a high rate of speed, when the driver lost control. The car then rolled over several times, hit a large fir tree, and crashed into the corner of a home.

“If you’re going 100 miles an hour you’re traveling so many feet per second that just a tiny turn of the wheel can send you all the way across the lane to the other lanes,” said Sgt. Moss.

No one inside the house was hurt.

The 18-year-old woman who was driving died at the scene. Deputies said she was not wearing a seatbelt. A 22-year-old man who was a passenger was critically injured with life-threatening injuries. Family and friends at the scene confirmed the driver and passenger were brother and sister.

“That was literally my only friend besides my little cousin and (inaudible), she was my only friend. She was everything,” Divinity Plummer, the woman’s best friend, said. “She was just having fun on the way home, really close to home, and didn’t think this would happen, but it happened.”

Divinity said she thinks the brother and sister went to the store to get something saying, “That’s probably the only reason she’d leave late at night with her brother.”

Another friend told KIRO 7 there was no power steering in the car, so if it hit a bump it would be hard to control.

The impact turned the front end of the car into a heap of twisted metal.

Neighbors said that they heard and felt a loud boom.

Some went outside to help and said that when they looked inside the car, they immediately knew the crash was tragic.

Neighbors said the man who survived was trapped inside the car. Deputies said firefighters had to extricate him and that he had been wearing a seatbelt.

“The engine was pushed pretty much back into the compartment... it didn’t even look like a car (on) the inside. The front seat was pushed all the way to the back seat,” said neighbor David King. “So, I got on my stomach and there was broken glass and I crawled up in that wreck and I took a look at what actually - actually everything that had happened inside the accident.”

King said crashes in the area are an ongoing problem.

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Spanaway fatal crash A woman was killed and her passenger has serious injuries after their car slammed into a house near Spanaway on May 4, 2023. (KIRO)

“So, this intersection 46th and 224th — they put a light in here not too long. There used to be a wreck here every two weeks... So finally, the county stepped in and put in a light. But the problem is that light, it’s not enough. This road — we’ve been complaining about this road — this road has high speed on it every day,” said King.

The home struck by the car has significant damage, even to its roof.

“The only way you go that far in the air... they had to be doing 100 miles an hour,” said King.

Pierce County Sheriff’s Department detectives said the car was not stolen and there were no signs of impairment.

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