ASSOCIATED PRESS
Kauai police officers try to piece together an auto accident that resulted in the deaths of three members of an Irvine, Calif., family on Thursday.
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Family crash survivor, 5, is recovering
WAIMEA, Kauai » A 5-year-old Irvine, Calif., boy is recovering at the Queen's Medical Center, the lone survivor of a family crash on Kauai.
Linden Kim, who was in the rear passenger seat, remains in critical but stable condition.
Kauai police Lt. Mark Scribner said Kim's uncle was with the boy at the hospital and expected to travel to Kauai today to identify his brother and sister-in-law, who died after their rental car attempted a U-turn and was broadsided by a truck.
Lan Kim Yim, 44, with her husband, Yong T. "Michael" Yim, 44, and Brandon, their 7-year-old son, died as a result of the crash. The uncle from California is Yim's identical twin brother, police said.
Lan Kim Yim was attempting a U-turn across the two-lane Kaumualii Highway at about 10 a.m. Thursday when her Chevrolet Impala rental car was struck by a Gas Co. propane truck, Scribner said yesterday.
"The (truck driver) was going 50 miles per hour," Scribner said. "You can't stop on a dime, especially with a big truck like that."
He said a mandatory blood sample was taken. But no citations or charges have been filed, and the driver did not appear to be speeding, according to Scribner.
COURTESY OF JERRY SCHAD VIA KITV
Killed in the crash were, clockwise from top left, Lan Kim Yim; her husband, Yong T. "Michael" Yim; and their son Brandon, 7. Linden Kim, 5, remains in critical condition.
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On impact the car went across the road and hit a coconut tree, Scribner said. All four family members were wearing their seat belts, he added.
The Gas Co. driver, Eddie Taniguchi III, a 10-year employee of the company, was making his regular delivery route, said company spokesman Steve Golden.
"Our feelings go out, especially to the family," he added.
Taniguchi, of Lihue, was treated for back pain and released from the hospital shortly after the crash.
But Golden and family members say it is going to be a while before he returns to work.
"He's pretty sick" over it, said Taniguchi's father, Eddie Taniguchi Jr.
Other family members said he had been advised not to speak to the media.
Golden said the company's president flew to Kauai yesterday to be with Taniguchi and his fellow workers and to lend support.
'We'll provide him with anything he needs," Golden added.
