A 58-year-old man was sentenced Tuesday for hitting eight Navy servicemen from Naval Air Station Pensacola in his vehicle in 2017 while drunk behind the wheel on Perdido Key Drive.

Eric Watt pleaded guilty to two counts of DUI with serious bodily injury and two counts of DUI damage to property or person in February.

On April 29, 2017, eight flight students from NAS Pensacola were walking home along Perdido Key Drive when they were hit from behind by a car driven by the Watt. The crash caused serious bodily injury to six of the eight victims and they were taken to several area hospitals. An investigation determined that Watts was under the influence of alcohol and marijuana at the time of the crash.

On Tuesday, Watt was sentenced to five years in state prison, followed by two years of community control and an additional five years probation, according to Assistant State Attorney Greg Marcille.

Community control is an enhanced version of probation that is much more restrictive, Marcille said.

A witness told authorities they observed the crash at about 8 p.m. and helped the eight victims who had been struck by Watt's Infiniti, according to a Florida Highway Patrol incident report.

When Florida Highway Patrol troopers arrived, they reportedly smelled alcohol on Watt and noticed his eyes were bloodshot, according to Watt’s arrest report.

Troopers administered two breathalyzer tests, and Watts blew 0.088 and 0.093. The legal limit is 0.08.

One witness told authorities they positioned themselves in front of Watt’s vehicle to stop him from driving away from the accident site, an incident report stated.

The eight men who were injured:

Jordan Lo, 24

Kevin Park, 24

Steven Parsons, 26

Christian Martinez, age unknown

Jerome Wallar, age unknown

Brandon Nunez, age unknown

Christopher Martinez, 25

Travis Hehman, 23

Colin Warren-Hicks can be reached at colinwarrenhicks@pnj.com or 850-435-8680.