LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WHAS11) -- Friends are paying tribute to a 19-year-old Louisville woman killed in an early morning traffic accident. Memorials are being left at the crash site where Liz Simmons died Monday morning, less than a mile from her home.
Police say alcohol, speed and a cell phone may have been involved.
Monday night, her friends honored her memory.
"Liz was the fun and energertic girl everybody always wants to be around," friend Mia Brondum said.
For friends of Simmons’, a trip to the site of the car crash that took her life is making the reality of her death set in.
Brondum and Stephanie Caple met Simmons in high school. They said Simmons was a Fern Creek graduate who had recently enrolled at Jefferson Community and Technical College after taking a semester off.
"I couldn't believe it [the accident] when I heard it. All I could say was what, are you serious? No way," Caple saple.
Caple said she just talked with Simmons last night, not knowing it would be the last time they'd speak.
"She messaged me about wanting to go out and hang out. I just decided to stay home," Caple said.
Police said Simmons was driving her Chevy Blazer along Broad Run Road when she ran off the shoulder, tried to correct herself, then eventually plowed down an embankment. A neighbor we talked to said the crash woke her up.
"In our house, I could hear her screaming for help, and that's one of those things that just stays with you," neighbor Lynn Humphrey said.
Simmons' friends said she was on the phone with her boyfriend at the time of the accident. With loss of a young life fresh on their minds, so too is the reality of death.
“It doesn't hit home until something like this happens. You don't feel the reality of it," Brondum said.
Neighbors said they've asked the state to make changes to the road, but they said they've been told that the road doesn't meet the right criteria.
Funeral arrangements have yet to be made.
