Witnesses heard 'people screaming for their lives' after Hingham Apple store crash
BOSTON – The moment an SUV slammed into the Hingham Apple store on Monday, it shook the businesses all around.
Two store managers at the Brandy Melville women's clothing shop next door were left shaking.
"It sounded like an explosion," assistant store manager Shaelin Mason said. "It was like a bomb or something went off, a big explosion."
Her friend and fellow store manager Chloe Murphy said she knew something wasn't right.
"We looked at each other like two deer in the headlights," Murphy said.
Fearing for their own safety, they ran and were the first to see the carnage that was around them.
"You could hear people screaming for their lives, screaming at the top of their lungs," Mason said.
Murphy said she saw someone trying to crawl out of the store and victims laying everywhere on the ground.
Bradley Rein, 53, of Hingham is now charged with motor vehicle homicide by reckless operation. Police said he told them his right foot became stuck on the accelerator as he drove through the Derby Street shops, and his vehicle barreled into the store.
Kevin Bradley of New Jersey was killed and 21 others hurt.
"Some older woman grabbed onto me with full body weight, sobbing into my arms as she was uncontrollably crying," Murphy said.
The managers said they never saw it was an SUV inside the store until a tow truck arrived, and they realized how close it all came to their own storefront.
"When I looked at how close it was to Brandy Melville, it was like 20 feet over and it could have been me or Shaelin," Murphy said.
The two young women said they're still trying to process what they witnessed, including what they say were heroic first responders.
"They were running into that building, I never saw people run that fast," Mason said.
They're now thinking of those impacted, including employees they knew, and acknowledge it will be sometime before they can return.
