Community mourns the loss of 2 killed in deadly crash

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WELD COUNTY, Colo. (KDVR) — It was the end of a long weekend making preparations to move from their house in Fleming, as Floyd, Sandy and Angel O’Dowd hit the road the evening of Sunday, Sept. 15.

Floyd and Sandy would be moving with their daughter, Angel, who was now attending Aims Community College in Greeley, into their son’s house for a time.

“It just got to the point where it didn’t make sense for them to be driving for 2-plus hours every day one way and then back,” said their son, Ezekiel Lira.

Angel put on her headphones to listen to music as they drove down US Highway 34, settling in for the hour-long drive.

Then, at 7:49 p.m. near the intersection with U.S. Highway 144, headlights approached directly for their vehicle. Colorado State Patrol said it was a head-on collision.

Kyle Howard, who owns the nearby Empire Gun Club, said it looked like the car was attempting to pass other vehicles in the lane of oncoming traffic. When he heard the crash, he rushed over to help.

“I instructed one of my friends who immediately called 911 and raced out and immediately ran up to the car and started trying to break windows to get inside,” Howard said.

He told FOX31 that one man, who was a local EMT, came over to help and they attempted to work on Floyd and Sandy O’Dowd. Neither one knew there was someone in the back seat until they heard a groan.

“You could not see anything in the back seat because there was no more back seat,” Howard said. “Shortly thereafter, we heard some groans coming from the backseat and that’s when we inspected further and realized that there was indeed a third passenger in the back seat who actually happened to be upside-down and was being crushed by the front passenger seat.”

They were able to break in and pull Angel from the back, an act her brother said he was grateful for.

“The other people who were the very first on the scene, you don’t want to be named because you said you don’t want to be a hero or anything, but you are,” Lira said. “You are our hero.”

Angel was taken to a nearby hospital in Loveland where she learned what happened.

“I had assumed that they were somewhere else in the hospital,” she said. “A few hours later they came in and told me that they, they didn’t make it.”

Over the next few days as the family came together from across the region to grieve, people from all over Weld County came out to show their support.

Floyd and Sandy were prominent members in the community. They were born in Colorado and had been in and around Weld County since the 1990s running a tattoo studio.

“Our mom was a gifted artist,” Lira said. “She was the first woman tattoo artist in Greeley.”

Her husband, Floyd, was quite the character himself, but also always knew how to make people feel at ease.

“[He] could just tell what that person needed,” Lira said. “If they needed to be distracted from being tattooed or if they needed to be joked around with or given a hard time.”

They were also people everyone could count on, and Lira jokingly said if you asked them, they would tell you they had 66 children.

“They always had cooked extra food just in case someone came by. They never really had a closed-door policy just in case someone needed a place to stay,” Lira said.

And he’s thankful for his last interaction with them.

“The last thing I ever said to mom and dad was ‘I love you.’ Because that’s the last thing I always say to them,” Lira said.

It is going to be a long road to recovery for Angel O’Dowd and the family as they recover emotionally and navigate funeral and medical expenses. They organized a GoFundMe to help cover some of those costs.

CSP said the crash is currently under investigation.

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Rachel Saurer

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