SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – Accident-reconstruction investigators are trying to figure out what caused an SUV carrying a family to plunge off a California cliff in a deadly wreck that happened shortly after child-welfare authorities went to their home to investigate possible abuse.
Five members of the Hart family – a free-spirited brood from Washington state who grew their own food and took up activist causes – were found dead. Searchers kept looking Friday for three more children believed to have been in the vehicle when it went over a scenic coastal overlook and landed on rocks in the Pacific Ocean below. The missing children may have been washed out to sea. “There are a lot of unknowns on this,” Mendocino County Sheriff Tom Allman said. “Several of the questions that have been asked today will never be answered.”