CHINO–Two people lost their lives and a third has sustained serious injuries in a freak one-vehicle accident in which a car traveling at excessive speed vaulted a backyard fence and landed in a swimming pool in the wee hours of Wednesday morning.
At 2:19 a.m., members of the Chino Police Department were dispatched to the scene of a single car mishap at the intersection of Schaefer Avenue and East End Avenue. Officers arrived to find an orange Corvette in the backyard pool of a home owned by Arthur Guerrero located at 3697 Alicia Way.
Alicia Way parallels Schaefer Avenue, dead-ending as a cul-de-sac just west of East End.
The convertible Corvette, which seats two but was carrying three passenger, was traveling westbound on Schaefer when the roadster hit the curb at the sharp 90 degree transition to northbound East End. Upon striking the curb, the car went airborne, flew over a wall and fence overgrown with ivy, and flipped. It landed upside-down in the pool.
All three occupants, who were most likely not wearing seat belts, were ejected. A 21-year-old woman in the car died instantly. A 27-year-old severely injured man was transported to Chino Valley Hospital, but was pronounced dead there. A 23-year-old woman was hospitalized and is clinging to life at press time.
The victims have not been identified. It is not known with definitude who was driving at the time of the incident. It was initially related that the 21-year-old now-deceased woman was driving, but the Chino Police Department revised that conclusion to a tentative determination that the man was behind the wheel.
The Schaefer/East End curve in Chino is infamous for motorists moving in both directions taking the turn at too-high of a speed, which is attested to by numerous gouges and chips out of the curb at that spot.
The speed limit along the stretch of Schaefer east of the 90 degree bend is 45 miles per but reduces to 15 miles per hour at the curve. Cars often make the turn at speeds above 40 miles per hour. Based upon the physics involved, the Corvette was very likely traveling at a speed greater than 70 miles per hour and approaching 80 miles per hour to achieve the momentum needed to clear the wall around Guerrero’s property.