Six members of a family are now dead after they were struck by a teen driver while traveling on a Texas highway. The 17-year-old was driving the wrong way on the highway. Rushil Barri, one of the victims, was driving a Honda Odyssey, and he and his family had just come from Fossil Rim Wildlife Center in Irving, Texas, when the fatal crash occurred.
The driver and his 17-year-old passenger were taken to the hospital with critical injuries.
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The teen entered a 'no passing' zone.
The crash happened on Route 67 around 4 p.m. Tuesday. The teen driver entered a “no passing zone," the Texas Department of Public Safety said, according to NBC News. Five passengers, along with Barri, 28, died after the collision.
The victims were Naveena Potabathula, 36; Nageswararao Ponnada, 64; Sitamahalakshmi Ponnada, 60; and two children: Krithik Potabathula, 10, and Nishidha Potabathula, 9. The sole surviving passenger is a 43-year-old man. He was hospitalized with critical injuries.
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Barri's roommate got an alert on his phone that he had been in a crash.
The roommate, Ayyappala Bandaru, told NBC 5 that he learned of the accident shortly after it happened.
“At 4:01 she got a message saying Rushil’s iPhone has met with a crash,” Bandaru said. “We were in shock like what just happened. We tried reaching everyone in the car and no one is picking up.”
Bandaru also identified the other victims as Barri's cousin, his cousin’s wife, their two young children, and his in-laws, per NBC 5.
'He had very big dreams,' Bandaru said of his roommate.
Barri moved to the US from India in August 2020. The other relatives lived in Alpharetta, Georgia. Bandaru said Barri, who was like a brother to him, was ambitious and driven, the Daily Mail reported.
“He had very big dreams,” Bandaru said. “He always used to think about tomorrow. He used to be like, ‘Man, we need to rule this world.’”
With many family members still in India, the bodies are being shipped there.
Many of the family members still live in India, so the Teluga Association of North America has stepped in to help return the bodies there. Bandaru, along with the association, has been tasked with informing the family of this unimaginable tragedy.
“It’s really bad,” Bandaru said, according to NBC 5. “We don’t know how to convey this news to them. We can’t just call them and say your son is no more, he met with an accident.”
