One of the victims in fatal Fort Worth I-35 pile-up crash remembered as loving mother
FORT WORTH, Texas - Fort Worth police are still investigating what led to a chain reaction crash that killed four people Monday.
The five-vehicle accident on I-35W shut down a major part of the interstate for several hours.
FOX 4 has learned more about one of the victims in the crash after speaking with her family.
Susana Longoria's family called her Susie. They shared that she was fun, hard-working, and taking classes to become a nurse.
But the thing she loved most was being a mom to her 9-year-old daughter.
With every goal she achieved, 31-year-old Longoria was always ready for the next one.
"Between working, school, and raising her daughter, she at times made it look easy," Longoria’s brother-in-law, Jose Fernandez, said. "She lived life, you couldn’t tell her no. No wasn’t in her vocabulary."
Fernandez and her older sister, Emma Velasquez, sat down with FOX 4 in Longoria’s childhood home.
The same home she was raising her daughter.
"Valerie was her world," Fernandez said.
When her 9-year-old daughter woke up and her mom wasn’t back from nursing school, the family knew something was wrong.
They called the hospital and police department, only to find out Longoria was involved in a major crash.
"Something told my wife, let’s just go down the medical examiner’s office down here and find out," Fernandez recalled.
Fort Worth police said a black Chrysler was traveling northbound on I-35W, near Berry Street, when it hit the center median at about 9 p.m. on Monday.
4 killed, 2 critically injured in Fort Worth pile-up crash
Police received a call about two vehicles involved in a minor accident. They were pulled over in the left shoulder. A truck pulled in to help, and then all three got hit by two 18-wheelers.
Longoria was the driver of that Chrysler.
Several other drivers stopped to help her out.
While everyone was out of their cars, police said a semi-truck with a trailer hit one of the cars and caused a chain reaction crash.
Longoria and three other people – 23-year-old Kiara Barker and her friend, 21-year-old Jasmine Jones, who were in the same car, and 25-year-old Chase Mapes, of Oklahoma - were killed.
"We pray for them too because we know the dad is hurting, the dad’s hurting, the mom’s hurting for her son’s loss over there. We pray for them," Fernandez said.
Grieving together from a far for their loved ones who are gone too soon.
"She’s going to be missed," Fernandez said. "It just hurts, it just hurts."
Fort Worth police said alcohol was not a factor in the crash, but it is still under investigation.
The traffic detectives will decide if any charges will be filed against the truck driver who caused the chain reaction crash.