Friends use tracking app to find crash site where their 18-year-old friend was killed
Close friends of an 18-year-old killed in a crash used an app to find her last location before anyone knew she had been in an accident.
By Carly Haynes
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HARNETT COUNTY, North Carolina (WRAL) — Close friends of an 18-year-old killed in a crash used an app to find her last location before anyone knew she had been in an accident.
State Highway Patrol troopers responded to an overturned car around 6:30 p.m. Tuesday in a pond off Norrington Road near Autry Road in Harnett County. Troopers later confirmed the car belonged to Zoey Barr.
The car was meters away from the main road, tucked behind tall grasses and shrubbery where it would have gone undetected had friends not checked her phone’s location.
Hailey Gernux and Abigail Branham first noticed Barr didn’t show up to her job at the scheduled start time of 3 a.m. They later texted Barr’s mom and boyfriend and discovered that nobody had seen her since she left for work.
Gernux checked the app Life360, which tracks the locations of friends and can monitor driving speeds based on phone data. They realized Barr’s phone had been turned off for more than 12 hours.
“That’s when I grew very concerned, because she doesn’t always have her phone completely off for a while,” Gernux said.
On top of grieving the loss of their best friend, Gernux and Branham were the ones to discover the crash site.
They went to Barr’s last pinged location and found Barr’s car in the pond, then called 911.
“Immediately, my heart just dropped,” Branham said. “No way she ended up there. How did that happen?”
Friends say it was pouring rain and dark at the time of the crash, which troopers say happened around 2:45 a.m. Tuesday.
Gernux believes there was a large branch sprawled across the road that Barr tried to avoid. Barr’s car went nearly 50 yards through a cornfield before hitting a ditch and overturning into the water.
“Definitely don’t take life for granted,” Branham said. “I was just talking to her the day before it happened and never thought the next morning that’s what we’d find.”
Friends will remember Barr for her fun nature and energizing spirit. They set up a memorial near her crash site and will be hosting a celebration of life on Barr’s 19th birthday, which would have been next week.
Friends and family have also set up a GoFundMe to help cover Barr’s funeral expenses.
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