DAILY NEWS WRITERS
Courtesy of the New York Daily News
A young boy’s trip to work with his father ended in disaster Saturday when the 13-year-old sneaked off to drive a forklift, flipped the 5,000-pound machine and crushed himself to death, police said.
Kevin Hrcka hopped onto the red forklift on the grounds of Miron Building Supply in Ridgewood, Queens, while his father was changing clothes near the end of his shift, officials said.
Using keys left in the ignition, Kevin revved the forklift’s motor and then sped about 100 feet in the machine before attempting to turn right, witnesses said.
The turn was too sharp and the forklift spun out and flipped, falling on top of the teen, witnesses and officials said.
“He jumped in the forklift. He drove down the yard full speed and tried to make too sharp of a turn,” said Derek Messing, vice president of the supply company.
Within moments, several workers at the sprawling site on Irving Ave. rushed to pull the 4-foot-by-10-foot vehicle off the small boy.
“The workers lifted it up with another forklift, and it was already too late,” Messing said.
The desperate cries from the supply site about 12:15 p.m. startled neighbor Dee Dee Smith.
“I heard somebody scream,” she said. “They were yelling, saying, ‘It was one of the kids!’ ”
Kevin died at the scene. Authorities covered his small body with a yellow tarp and placed cinder blocks around its edges to prevent the wind from blowing it away.
The boy was meeting his father, Robert Hrcka, who was supposed to get off work about 1 p.m., Messing said.
Messing said children are not allowed in the yard, which is filled with pallets of bricks, vehicles and other building supplies.
Forklift operator Vincent Sosnowski, 24, who arrived in the aftermath of the accident, said all the workers know to keep children away from the heavy equipment.
“One of the rules is don’t bring your kids into the yard,” he said. “I have kids of my own, and they’re not allowed in the yard.”
Sosnowski said he met Kevin last month at a Christmas party and thought the teen was extremely well behaved.
“He was the definition of a good kid. He was really quiet,” Sosnowski said. “He shouldn’t have been here.”
The teen’s father spoke with detectives from the 104th Precinct for more than an hour after the grisly accident.
His head hung low and his hands stuffed in his pockets, the dad walked with an unidentified woman to his car on the building supply lot. He drove off without another word.
