Two people were killed and five were injured after a large tree branch fell onto spectators during a fireworks display in Illinois.
Minutes after the show began in Rock Island, a branch from a 100-year-old oak tree fell about 25 feet to the ground, crushing families sitting outside the county courthouse, ABC reports.
The branch had a circumference of just over eight feet at the base, and was 45-feet-long.
“I was sitting about 50 feet away,” Melanie Brown Ledbetter told KWQC. “I was turned talking to my friend and heard the loud crackle of the tree breaking and saw it fall.”
Rock Island County Sheriff Gerry Bustos told ABC that Daniel Mendoza Sr., 61, was found dead at the scene and Lawrence Anderson, 72, was pronounced dead at the hospital. A 21-year-old pregnant woman near full term was among five injured, Iowa's Gazette reports. After being transported to the hospital, she gave birth to a baby. Both are in good health.
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Authorities are investigating why the branch broke.
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