Driver whose car vaulted over tow truck on Georgia highway says: ‘I thought I was going to die’

A woman whose car was captured on video vaulting into the air over a tow truck and crashing onto a Georgia highway says she’s recovering after spending two weeks in hospital and undergoing several surgeries.

“I don’t really remember much, but I know that I thought I was going to die,” Tanaijsha Bruton told WALB-TV in an interview. “It hurts really, really bad. I felt everything.”

A Lowndes County sheriff’s deputy was responding to an earlier wreck on May 24 when his body camera recorded Bruton’s sedan driving up the ramp of a flatbed tow truck, which had stopped in the highway’s opposite left lane, and flying into the air.

Tanaijsha Bruton's vehicle goes airborne after driving up the ramp of a flatbed tow truck on a Georgia highway. Photo / AP

The car soared 37m before landing upside down, according to a police report. It struck another vehicle and tumbled end over end before coming to rest.

“When I go to sleep that’s pretty much what I dream about,” 21-year-old Bruton said. “It just replays over and over.”

Bruton was hospitalised in intensive care in neighboring Florida. She said her internal injuries required at least four surgeries and she’s grateful to have survived.

And she was stunned by the video footage of the crash, once she finally saw it.

“My family didn’t want to show me the video,” Bruton said. “But of course, I’m hardheaded and got on social media.”