A North Carolina father died after leaving his daughter’s ninth birthday party, when his GPS guided him to a bridge that was destroyed in 2013.
On Sept. 30, Phil Paxson was heading home after his daughter’s celebration in Hickory, North Carolina, on a “dark and rainy night,” his mother-in-law Linda McPhoee Koeing shared on Facebook on Oct. 3.
“He was following his GPS which led him down a concrete road to a bridge that dropped off into a river,” she continued. “The bridge had been destroyed 9 years ago and never repaired.”
Koeing said that the bridge also didn’t have any “barriers or warning signs to prevent the death of a 47-year-old father of two daughters.”
The state’s highway patrol said that barricades to warn drivers about the faulty bridge were previously there, but they appeared to have been moved.
The North Carolina State Highway Patrol said it was alerted to a car in a creek on the morning of Oct. 1, Charlotte, North Carolina’s NBC affiliate WCNC reported. Officers arrived to find that Phil’s 2020 Jeep Gladiator had flipped upside down and was underwater.
Phil’s body was recovered from inside the vehicle and authorities believe the accident happened at 11 p.m. on Friday.
“He will be greatly missed by his family and friends. It was a totally preventable accident. We are grieving his death,” she wrote.
His widow, Alicia Paxson, shared photos of the bridge on her own Facebook page, pointing out in one post that her husband’s death was “an avoidable tragedy.” She also shared articles that date back to 2014 about families urging the bridge to be fixed.
“How is it nine years that this did not happen, and why did it have to be him?” Alicia questioned to the outlet. “Like, why do my kids have to have no dad now, you know? Who’s responsible? Somebody is responsible.”
She shared how on that fateful night, they had a barbecue at a friend’s house for their daughter’s birthday.
“When it was time to go, we packed up all the decorations, he packed up the van, and he loaded the girls into the van,” she said. “He took a left, and I took a right, and that was his mistake. One wrong turn, and now he’s gone.”
One family friend also told the outlet, “It could have been them. It could have been the girls. Usually, they all drive together and thank God that night they were not.”
