Turkey smashes through car windshield in Missouri; 2 women hurt

Wes Johnson | Springfield (Mo.) News-Leader

Two women were sent to the hospital after a freak accident involving a wild turkey.

Dustin Wood was a passenger in the back seat of his mom's van — his girlfriend, Pam Standfield, in the front passenger seat — when a 20-pound flying turkey smashed through the car's windshield.

"We were coming westbound on Highway 60 by the bridge over the James River," Wood recalled. "My mom was driving and noticed something flying on the left side. She thought it was a hawk. The next thing, there was a sound like a shotgun bang and it blew the windshield out of the van."

Vicki Wood's face was cut by flying glass, and Standfield was partially struck in the face by the bird and shards of glass.

"After it hit us, I was spitting glass," Vicki Wood said. "We're very lucky that Pam was looking down for her phone when it hit... It came in right where her head was. If she had been looking up, it could have been a lot worse. It was a blessing she had her head down."

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Standfield said she had just turned her head to reach for her phone when the turkey smashed through the windshield, hit her in the face and careened off the passenger window.

"I got hit so hard it knocked me out," she said. "Never in my life would I think something like this could happen. It's a freak accident."

Standfield said her face is sore and she's still recovering from the glass cuts. She had no interest in keeping a feather from the turkey as a memento.

"I don't think I even want to eat turkey at Thanksgiving anymore," she said.

Vicki Wood managed to stop the van on the side of the James River bridge. After the vehicle was stopped, her son assessed the situation.

"There were guts all over the front side window and the turkey flew all the way to the back of the car. There were feathers all over."

The turkey did not survive.

Emergency responders took both women to Mercy hospital.

"They did a CT scan on my girlfriend looking for fractures in her head," Wood said. "She ended up getting some stitches above her eyebrow."

Wood, in the back seat, said he only got some pieces of glass stuck in his kneecap.

"It could have been worse," he said.

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