Horrifying new footage shows the moment a car nearly swept away a pedestrian before driving off the end of a Virginia pier in what is believed to be a suicide attempt.
The video shows the vehicle racing along the sidewalk before crashing through barriers and plunging into the Atlantic Ocean in Virginia Beach on Saturday morning.
It comes as sonar images released on Monday show the wreckage at the bottom of the ocean as rescuers battle bad weather to recover it.
Meanwhile, a terrifying underwater clip from the crash site was shared by police as they continue their investigation.
Creepy cellphone footage first emerged Sunday of the car speeding across the 14th Street Fishing Pier before plunging over the edge into the sea.
It sparked nationwide horror and mystery when police admitted they do not know whether the driver escaped or was dead.
In the morning light you can see a silhouette walking along a sidewalk just as the SUV screams past, crossing first a bike path and then onto the wooden boardwalk of the pier.
A sonar image from Virginia Beach police shows the car on its roof, lying in 20 feet of water
Creepy underwater footage released by Virginia Beach police shows the car that drove off a 650-foot-long pier, lying on the ocean floor
The car’s taillights were visible early Saturday morning as it drove off the pier
The new footage shows a silhouette walking along a sidewalk as the SUV screams past, first crossing a bike path and then onto the pier’s wooden boardwalk.
It then disappears from view, before speeding off the pier – causing widespread destruction – and over the edge.
On Monday, video taken by divers using an ROV showed them reaching the vehicle, which is currently upside down on the ocean floor in about six meters of water.
The water was too murky and the sea too rough to make out any distinguishing features of the vehicle, such as its license plate number or who might have been inside.
The car plunged into the ocean around 6:50 a.m. Saturday morning when the vehicle crashed through three barriers before careening down the length of the 650-foot pier.
The vehicle braked briefly before ramming through the wooden railing at the end of the pier and plunging straight over the edge into the sea.
A woman standing on the beach captured the incident on camera when she heard a loud crash and started filming.
The red SUV crosses a bike path before heading straight onto the boardwalk
The car makes no effort to stop while a pedestrian is just a few feet away from the collision
The Virginia Beach Fire Department arrived on the scene within four minutes and sent a diver into the water to search and rescue everyone in the car.
When the police arrived on the scene, the divers had already been removed from the water.
Police are now working to recover the car and any occupants, but said they still do not know how many people were inside.
“No one wants to provide a solution to this more than we do,” said Sgt. Brian Ricardo of VBPD Special Operations said. “We’re as frustrated as anyone that we can’t get in the water, and there’s nothing we can do to move this forward.”
Officers searched for the vehicle using side scan sonar, which was immediately located on sonar.
The car is on its roof and is unstable as it moves through the rough current.
At one point the car appeared to suddenly brake before going over the edge into the sea
You then see the car crash into the ocean and break through the last railing
“The car is unstable,” explained Sgt. Ricardo. “The fear for us is not that it will drift, but that one of the divers will become entangled in the car.”
“Strong currents and extremely poor visibility made it too dangerous for divers to safely navigate and assess the area, especially near a submerged SUV that was rocking on its roof in the turbulent current,” police tweeted Monday.
The water temperature is said to be in the mid 40s.
Witnesses said the car drove onto the boardwalk from Atlantic Avenue at a high rate of speed and crashed through the first barriers on the pier.
In a series of tweets on Monday, police outlined their plans for the future.
“The goal of this mission remains to safely recover the vehicle, reunite all occupants with their loved ones and preserve the integrity of all evidence.
The car drove through three barriers and reached the end of the pier
Police investigate the scene at the Virginia Beach Fishing Pier where a car drove through a gate on the pier around dawn in Virginia Beach early Saturday
People stand at the spot where a car crashed through a fence at the Virginia Beach Fishing Pier
The car continued down the pier, eventually driving into the ocean water at the end
Police received a call around 6:50 a.m. on Saturday, but the challenging ocean conditions mean it has yet to be recovered
“We appreciate our community’s concern about this incident. This is an ongoing investigation and we will continue to share updates as we can. We are working hard to bring closure to those affected through our investigation and recovery process.
VBPD divers are trained in water rescue and not underwater rescue.
Instead, the department deployed a team of recovery divers, with specific skills and equipment trained in retrieving sunken objects, to recover the rooftop SUV.
Due to deteriorating weather and sea conditions, the VBPD was unable to dive into the water on Saturday.
Divers from Crofton Industries have been hired to assist with the recovery efforts.
The company has the right experience and equipment to rescue objects from the ocean floor.
After being on site for much of the afternoon, rough seas caused chains and mooring lines to break during the recovery, meaning the dive team will have to try again later in the week.
“I can understand people’s frustrations,” said Sgt. Ricardo said. ‘But to tell you how dangerous it was, they broke two bridles that held their cranes in place and they clipped a mooring line from the crane ship onto their submarine.
The pier remained closed Monday while police investigated
Some of the damaged barriers are on the ground at the pier entrance
On Monday, teams of researchers were gathered at the end of the pier
Some parts of the pier were damaged when the car drove through anything in its way
Virginia Beach Police are gathered at the pier as they conduct an investigation
The pier is 200 meters long and the water at the end is about 4.5 meters deep. The water temperature is in the mid 40s
“Because it’s a crime scene, we want to leave the car as encapsulated as possible because if we open that portal to the ocean, we’re going to lose evidence,” Ricardo explains.
The next attempt to recover the vehicle will likely be Thursday or Friday.
One of the women who caught the incident on camera, Kaylynn Crawford, spoke out WAVY: ‘At first we saw that it was happening very quickly. We thought we would just go for it.
“But towards the end the car started to slow down, and it looked like it was almost staggering at the end. Then suddenly it fell over the pier.’
Charlotte Murphy, who works at a seafood restaurant on the pier, told the outlet: ‘They went through three gates, which is pretty crazy and these are really, really strong gates. It’s really crazy to think about.
“As soon as I got here, I was like, ‘Holy cow, that’s the craziest thing I’ve heard in a long, long time.’