LONG ISLAND, N.Y. — Police on Long Island are searching for surveillance video they are hopeful will help identify the occupants of a car from which they believe a pumpkin was launched at the windshield of a passing vehicle on Sunday.
According to WPIX, the 22-year-old victim’s 2009 Ford Fusion was traveling westbound on Town Line Road in Hauppauge when the gourd slammed into the windshield, police said early Friday.
Police on hunt for vandals who threw pumpkin through windshield of moving car in Suffolk County https://t.co/XvR0d5mFHB
— CBS New York (@CBSNewYork) November 2, 2022
“As you see by the glass, it’s pretty bad damage,” Nick Costi told WNBC, adding, “Thankfully it didn’t go through the windshield ... I’m thankful to be alive.”
Neither Costi nor his girlfriend, who was his only passenger, were injured in the assault, but that in no way minimized the terror the pair experienced, the TV station reported.
“When I closed my eyes, I really had no idea if I was alive to be honest with you, so I opened them and saw the broken glass and that I was still moving,” Costi told WNBC, noting that he was able to pull over to the side of the road and park the car safely.
Photos of Costi’s vehicle, released by Suffolk County police, show that the damage appeared limited to the driver’s side of the windshield.
Investigators determined that the pumpkin had been hurled from another vehicle headed in the opposite direction, but a description of the suspected vehicle was not immediately available, WPIX reported.
According to WNBC, a similar incident occurred on Thanksgiving Day 18 years ago when a Long Island woman nearly died after someone threw a frozen turkey onto her windshield from a moving car.
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