Body found after SUV plunged into Everglades canal near Mack's Fish Camp, BSO says
A body has been recovered after a deadly crash Wednesday night in the Everglades in western Broward.
The Broward Sheriff's Office said just before 9 p.m. they received a call about a vehicle going into a canal near the 18000 block of Krome Avenue, not far from Mack's Fish Camp.
Marshall Jones from Mack's Fish Camp was the first to realize something was wrong when he was returning home on Wednesday night.
"I saw a series of skid marks that were not there when I left an hour earlier. The skid marks led to this disturbance behind me (pointing to a gap in the foliage along the canal) which was a telltale that a vehicle had gone into the ditch," he said.
Deputies from Weston were dispatched to the scene along with members of BSO's dive team, marine patrol and missing persons unit. Once there, they found a Chevy Tahoe submerged in the canal. However, no one was inside.
They immediately began a search.
Family and friends have identified the driver as 26-year-old Ramiro Gomez.
Teresa Rojo, a friend of Gomez, said they went looking for him when they couldn't reach him.
"He was missing and then we tried to find him. When we saw the police, we came here and then we found out that there was a truck under the water. We figured out it was the truck that we were trying to find," Rojo said.
It was Gomez's brother who found his body in the water on Thursday morning.
Gomez's family and friends said he liked to fish in the area and they don't know what caused him to go off the road.
Jones said he believes, based on the skid marks, that Gomez lost control and was trying to stop, but ended up going over the embankment into the water.
"The vehicle hit the water with such force that it blew the entire front grille, bumper and headlights out of the vehicle. We found them floating in the canal," he said.
The sheriff's office said traffic homicide detectives are now looking into the circumstances surrounding the crash.
