Family of woman killed when car plunged into Little Calumet River calls for improved safety measures
The family of a Chicago woman killed when a driver lost control and crashed a car into the Little Calumet River said the stretch of road where the crash happened is too dangerous, and they want the city to address concerns and make it safer.
Ralphelle Howard, 26, was riding in a car with four other people around 2:30 a.m. on Tuesday when the driver lost control, crashed through a barrier near 130th and Indiana, and plunged into the river.
Three people, including the driver, were able to swim to shore. Chicago Police Department divers pulled 24-year-old Trumayne Sanders out of the river, and he was taken to University of Chicago Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.
Crews spent hours searching for Howard before her body was found in the river on Wednesday.
"She was a great person. When she walked in the room, her smile just bring happiness and joy to everybody," said her father, Bernard.
Her family said the crash might have been preventable and it's time for the city to address serious safety concerns on that road.
"My main focus is to make sure this don't happen to nobody else who'll have to bury their child or their loved ones," her father said.
When drivers head west on 130th Street toward Indiana Avenue, they face a sharp turn after passing through a railroad overpass, and while road signs indicate a 25 mph speed limit for the turn, CBS News Chicago witnessed several drivers failing to slow down, and trucks getting stuck at the sharp turn.
Howard's family and friends, like Kamauri Burnett, want the city to do more to keep drivers safe at that turn.
"Proper railing, and lights, and even speed bumps; something of that nature," Burnett said. "I just feel if the city took the proper precautions, you know, a lot of these deaths could have been prevented."
This was not the first deadly crash at 130th and Indiana. In 2024, the driver of a stolen U-Haul was killed after driving into the river.
A spokesperson for the Chicago Department of Transportation said guardrail separating the road from the river was replaced following that deadly crash, but was that guardrail intact and working how it should at the time of the crash that killed Howard and Sanders?
It's one of the questions CBS News Chicago has asked CDOT, as well as about any plans to make the road safer, like the family is calling for.
"It's so much money and infrastructure that they build in Chicago, but you look around this whole area, it's nothing here," Howard's father said.
A spokesperson for CDOT said there are plans in place to repair the guardrail and they're looking at opportunities to improve safety in the area, with a focus on reducing dangerous speeding.
But the current guardrail didn't stop the crash that killed Howard, so her family wants to see more.
"This is a call for action that something must be done," her father said.
The driver in the crash that killed Howard and Sanders, a 24-year-old man who has not yet been named, was cited for speeding.
