A Freightliner semitruck struck and killed a Virginia woman on Interstate 75 early Wednesday morning.
Ashley E. Lawson, 28, of Chesapeake, Va., died after she darted onto the highway from an emergency lane near mile marker 387, about three miles south of the Archer Road exit, according to a Florida Highway Patrol news release.
At about 2:30 a.m. Wednesday, Orbin E. Samples, 45, of Dry Ridge, Ky., was driving a 2007 Columbia Freightliner southbound on the outside lane when he saw something move in front of him, according to the report.
Samples told FHP officers that he couldn’t avoid “the object” and hit it. He pulled onto the emergency lane and found that he hit Lawson.
Alachua County emergency personnel pronounced Lawson dead at the scene, according to the report.
Officials stopped southbound traffic in two lanes for about four hours as they cleared the accident.
Samples and his passenger, Teresa Samples, 44, of Dry Ridge, Ky., were not hurt in the accident, according to the report.
Contact Kathryn Varn at kvarn@alligator.org.
