SAN FRANCISCO, (Reuters) – The bodies of a new bride and four friends who died trapped inside a burning limousine on a bridge over San Francisco Bay were found pressed against an opening between the passenger compartment and driver’s seat, a county coroner said yesterday.
Four other women managed to escape the Lincoln Town Car but suffered burns or smoke inhalation when it erupted in flames on Saturday night while heading across the San Mateo-Hayward bridge to a party at a hotel in Foster City, about 25 miles south of San Francisco overlooking the bay, the California Highway Patrol said.
The San Francisco Chronicle newspaper reported that among the dead was new bride Neriza Fojas, 31, who had been celebrating her recent marriage with eight female friends, all of them in their 30s or 40s.
Investigators were seeking to determine yesterday what caused the fire that law enforcement officials said killed the five women as they sought to escape.
A spokeswoman for Santa Clara Valley Medical Center said two of the surviving passengers remained hospitalized there yesterday afternoon, one in critical condition and the other in serious condition. Representatives for Stanford Medical Center, where the other two surviving victims were taken, have declined to comment on their condition. The Los Angeles Times reported that one had been released.
The San Mateo County medical examiner, Robert Foucrault, told reporters at a press conference yesterday morning that the deceased women were found clustered around a small window in a partition between the passenger compartment and driver’s seat.
