GENTRY — According to Associated Press news reports, Lily Murphy, 18, of Gentry, was among those killed in a fatal crash in Oklahoma late Sunday night.
Murphy was a 2017 graduate of Gentry High School, was on the cheerleading squad and wrote for the high school newspaper, Pioneer Press. She was currently a student at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Okla.
According to cited Oklahoma Highway Patrol reports, five teenagers were killed when the pickup truck in which they were occupants hit a guardrail, crossed the road and went through a bridge railing and plummeted into the creek below.
An article in the Tulsa World stated: "Donovan Caldwell, 18, of Muskogee (Okla.), was driving a 2006 Chevrolet Colorado pickup truck southbound on Welling Road near Tahlequah when the crash occurred about 10:40 p.m. Sunday, according to an Oklahoma Highway Patrol report. The truck veered off the roadway and struck a guardrail. The truck came back onto the roadway and drove through a bridge railing, about 4 miles south of Tahlequah, on the opposite side, according to the report. The vehicle fell about 35 feet and landed on its top in the Baron Fork Creek. The truck submerged fully.
"An OHP report says 18-year-old Donovan Caldwell of Muskogee; 18-year-old Jessica Swartwout of McAlester; 19-year-old Drake Wells of Thackerville; 18-year-old Rhianna Seely of Salina; and 18-year-old Lily Murphy of Gentry, Ark., all died at the scene of the crash near Tahlequah."
The report says the cause of the crash was not yet determined.