Police on Saturday identified the two Mountain View High School seniors who died Friday night in what investigators say was a high-speed crash in east Vancouver.
Friends of the teens, however, say they found out about the deaths minutes after the crash occurred through social media or by driving by the scene.
“I was in denial,” said 15-year-old sophomore Lexie Miller, who found out about the fatal crash through Facebook like many of her peers did.
The Vancouver Police Department said William W. McCulloch, 17, was driving an Acura Integra with Shaun M. Hvass, 18, in the passenger seat. Around 9:45 p.m., the car crashed into a traffic pole on the west side of Northeast 136th Avenue and Fourth Street, with enough force to tear the car in two.
When officers arrived, both teens were dead.
Police have not released additional details about the crash, which is still under investigation.
Several students gathered at the intersection Saturday, across the street from the post office, where they erected a makeshift memorial.
Branden Reed, 19, a senior at Mountain View, said that McCulloch had just gotten his license and the car, which they fixed up together.
“He was just an awesome person to be around,” said Reed, who last saw McCulloch at lunch on Friday. “He was pretty much willing to take the first step when no one else would.”
Other students described the two teens as funny, happy and “the class clowns.”
The front of the Integra had a sticker on it that read “Hoonigan,” the name of a motor racing team. It’s also a slang term for someone who drives recklessly.
Some of the teens speculated that McCulloch may have been drifting, a driving technique where the vehicle skids through a curve. Glass littered the corner of the sidewalk, which detectives spray-painted while investigating the crash Friday night.
Miller picked up a shard of glass and pursed her lips. It was in the rough shape of a heart.
“We saw them yesterday,” Daisy Garcia, 15, said Saturday. “They just wanted to make people happy.” She said she was at Mountain View’s football game Friday at nearby McKenzie Stadium and got a text from her mom about the crash.
Mountain View High School has T-shirts that bear the names of six students who have died since 2009: Mandy Lathim, Quinn Driscoll, Chad White, Aaron Brandley, Mindy Doster and Robert Gonzales. Now, two more students have to be added to that list.
The deaths of McCulloch and Hvass also increase the number of people who have died so far this year on Clark County roadways to 34 — a figure much higher than in years past.
