A car driven by a woman in her 80s plunged into the sea at a fishing port in Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi Prefecture, on Tuesday morning, killing her and injuring a man it struck on the way, police said. The man, a fisheries worker in his 20s, had his left foot severed.
Police said the kei car — a small-engined class of vehicle widely used in Japan — went into the water shortly after 6 a.m. at the Kottoi market. The crash happened before the day's auction began.
According to people connected to the local fisheries cooperative, the woman's car drove across the market grounds and headed for the sea. The man was in its path. The car hit him and then both went into the water.
The man had been laying out fish in boxes ahead of the auction, the cooperative members said. He was pulled from the sea but suffered a serious injury, with his left foot severed.
The woman was taken to hospital in a state of cardiopulmonary arrest and was later confirmed dead.
Witnesses describe the car accelerating toward the water
A cooperative official said he was inside the office when he heard the car. He had been about to go out and tell the driver that vehicles were not allowed inside, he said.
“When I was about to leave the office, the sound of the car got louder and louder. It dived into the sea.”a fisheries cooperative official, witness
The official said the driver was a broker who had arrived just after 6 to be ready for the second auction at 6:30.
Another cooperative member said workers believed at first that the young man had jumped in to rescue the driver. "He was actually knocked into the sea by the car," the member said.
The official said those at the market guessed that the driver had meant to stop as usual but hit the accelerator instead of the brake. Police have not stated a cause.
A white kei car was lifted from the water with seawater streaming from its cracked windshield. Polystyrene boxes, apparently for holding fish, were visible in the back seat.