A teenage girl is expected to survive after being struck by an SUV driver on her way to summer class Thursday morning, according to police and her distraught mother.
Authorities say 19-year-old Suri Meza was riding her skateboard in a crosswalk at the intersection of Neptune Avenue and Brighton 10th Street in Brighton Beach when a 43-year-old man driving a 2024 Hyundai Tucson made a right turn and struck her.
Jose Cristales, an off-duty New York City Fire Department firefighter assigned to Ladder Company 104 in Williamsburg, was asleep at his nearby home at the time of the incident but ran outside when his panicked sister told him what had happened.
“I quickly grabbed my shorts and shoes and ran downstairs completely unprepared for the situation,” Cristales said.
“Then I saw this young woman… my heart automatically started beating. How can this happen? [were] That’s what I had in my head, but it all seemed to happen in slow motion.”
Cristales immediately realized Mesa was pinned under the steering wheel of the SUV. “She’s in bad shape,” he said.
So he asked a nearby construction worker for help.
“We quickly pulled her out from under the pin,” Cristales said.
“I automatically checked for a pulse, checked for breathing. She wasn’t breathing. I automatically started CPR with compressions right there.”
“After about 50 compressions she regained consciousness. She was breathing, so the ambulance and fire departments came and wrapped her up and sent her off.”
FDNY Engine 246 arrived quickly, followed by emergency services from Station 43, and rushed her to NYU Langone Brooklyn Hospital, where she is listed in stable condition.
“Right now her condition is critical. She hasn’t been stabilized and she’s been diagnosed with being very unwell,” her mother, Gerita Flores, tearfully told The Washington Post after receiving a call from the hospital as monitors beeped.
Mesa’s mother said her daughter was attending summer school of her own volition and that she was a bright, positive person who was on the right path in life.
“She was committed to school, she had dreams, she wanted to go to college, and that’s why she was there,” Flores said.
Mesa is Flores’ oldest son, she said.
“She was very kind and loving towards her siblings,” Flores said, sobbing as she caught her breath.
Meanwhile, the driver, Saddam Tufail, has been arrested and will be charged with failing to yield to pedestrians and failing to take due care, police said.
He was released on a summons, police said.
