Just nine days after being crowned Blountstown High School homecoming queen, 18-year-old Cierra Brown is recovering from injuries sustained in a wreck that killed her boyfriend Sunday night.
The pair were traveling south on SR 71 in Jackson County around 9:45 p.m. CT when Alex C. Brack, 21, of Defuniak Springs, ran off the road.
According to the Florida Highway Patrol, the vehicle collided with a culvert, became airborne and struck a utility guy wire support pole before landing on the ground and overturning.
Alex was ejected from his pickup truck and pronounced dead at the scene by Jackson County EMS.
Neither Alex nor Cierra had been wearing a seatbelt.
Cierra was taken to Jackson Hospital with a gash on the back of her head and cuts around her eyes. She was released later that night and is now home with her parents, LeeLee and Renee Brown. Her father said Tuesday that doctors “had not ruled out a concussion” and she was still experiencing blurry vision.
LeeLee Brown said his daughter was sleeping on the ride home. “She laid her head down and that’s probably what saved her,” he said, explaining that she was thrown into the floorboard during the crash.
‘SHE WAS FRANTIC’
Someone who stopped to help after driving up on the scene late Sunday night said Cierra was able to stand up and was talking but appeared dazed.
“She was frantic. She was telling people they needed to find her boyfriend,” the witness said. The man, who declined to be named, said he tried to help calm her and, at her insistence, began looking in the woods nearby for Alex. A nurse had also stopped and was consoling Cierra as she waited for Alex to be found.
As emergency responders reached the scene, they realized the driver was under the vehicle and had not survived. Cierra was pulled away and taken to another vehicle as efforts were made to reach the body under the truck, the man said.
When her parents learned of the wreck, they rushed to the site, unsure of what had happened. “I was numb as we drove up to the wreck, we thought there were two fatalities,” Brown said. They were grateful to find their daughter had survived and devastated to learn that Alex was dead.
The Browns went to meet their daughter at the hospital. “I was crying so bad,” Brown said. As they got to the hospital, Alex’s father, Greg Brack, called him. “I heard there were two fatalities,” he said. Brown replied, “No.” Brack asked how Cierra was. Brown told him she had some injuries but would be all right. “So that means it was Alex,” his father said.
Brown said he didn’t know what to say. “I couldn’t hardly tell him what had happened,” he said.
Then Brack told him, “It’s going to be all right. God gave him 21 years.”
Alex’s parents arrived in Marianna later that night. Trooper Jason Britt walked Greg Brack down to the wreckage, where Alex’s body was still under his truck. “His father put his hand on Alex’s, told him he loved him and said goodbye,” according to Brown.
Services are planned Sunday in Walton County. “Rarely do you meet a young man like him,” Brown said. “I was proud to know him.
BECOMING FAMILY
LeeLee Brown was wary when he first learned that Alex had seen a photo of his daughter and wanted to meet her. He admits he has “run off a few” young men who’ve wanted to date his daughter and he hardly expected to give his blessing to a stranger. But then Alex called him. “Do you mind if I come and introduce myself to you?” Alex asked him. They talked a bit and Brown was impressed with Alex and agreed to meet with him.
Brown said his daughter had recently been in a difficult relationship and wasn’t really open to a new one at that time. “Alex was sent to us to show us what a young man is supposed to act like,” her father said.
Alex and Cierra had been dating for the past six or seven months and he had become a part of the family.
After playing in a football game Saturday, Alex drove to Blountstown to be with Cierra. The next morning, they got up early and went hunting. Then they came back to attend church with her family. That afternoon, they left to go to the Peanut Festival in Dothan.
“He’s from a family of handshakers but I’m a hugger,” said Brown, explaining that when the pair left that afternoon, “I gave Alex a fatherly hug and told him we loved him.” He also hugged his daughter, telling her, “Cierra, daddy loves you, baby.”
‘WE LOVED HIS SPIRIT’
Alex was at Bowles Field on Homecoming Night to see Cierra crowned Oct. 24. He was a civil engineering major at the Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne.
He was a kicker for three years on the Florida Tech football team. He helped the Panthers defeat Shorter University on Saturday, Nov.1, in Rome, GA by converting all four of his extra point attempts in the team’s 34-30 win, the school noted in a statement about his death Monday.
“Our team and program loved Alex’s spirit that he brought to this team every day. He was a great young man who was going to be very successful in his life,” head coach Steve Englehart said. “He always had a great attitude, whether or not he was the starting kicker. He was very much a part of this team and loved this team. He would do anything possible to help this team be successful.”
A candlelight vigil was held Monday evening on the school’s practice field. The team will honor him throughout the remainder of the season, including wearing decals with Alex’s number 92 on their helmets, according to a post on the school’s website.
“I hope that every member of our team honors him by really trying to have the same type of attitude and desire to be a part of something special, because that’s what Alex did,” Englehart said. “He had a very contagious attitude that we all loved.”
“The loss of this young man will be acutely felt by the Florida Tech family,” said President and CEO Anthony J. Catanese. “His spirit, his energy, his ability to make better those around him were all key components of his character. We grieve with his family, and offer them our heartfelt condolences.”
FRIENDS OFFER COMFORT
The Brown family has received an outpouring of love and support from the community following Sunday’s tragedy.
“When something like this happens, people in Calhoun and Liberty County don’t just come over, they run over,” Brown said.
He said their yard was full of young people from both counties who gathered to console his daughter.
And they didn’t just say a few words and leave.
“Her girlfriends came in, took their shoes off, got in the bed with her and cried,” he father said.
Sometimes, they would wait in the living room as she slept. “It just tickles my soul to see how her friends have treated her,” her father said.